Harry Potter and the Slytherins
by Noa Alexandra
Summary: Harry Potter begins his story as usual, until he hesitates under the sorting hat and gets thrown in Slytherin. Which sucks. Begins closely following the story of Sorcerer's Stone and gets more and more separate.
1. In Which Harry Hesitates

Professor McGonagall lowered the hat onto the boy's nervous head, where it came suddenly to life, mouth moving a mile a minute.

The boy was puzzled. Not moments before had he seen the hat sorting his peers-to-be without a moment's hesitation, yet here he sat, waiting rigidly as the hat mumbled to itself in an old voice, a human voice, which made the boy even more discomforted. He turned his head this way and that, as though even in the blindness the great size of the hat brought on him he hoped to find the voice.

It was after one particularly violent jerk of his head that the hat began to speak louder and the boy realized it was speaking to him. His mind raced as he struggled to catch the hat's one-sided conversation, and at last the words began to make sense. Yet the moment he caught on, he lost track, for the one word he heard was 'Slytherin.'

For a moment his mind went blank, yet the hat kept talking, so he shook his head and forced himself to listen again.

"...not the type for Ravenclaw, and not as friendly as the Hufflepuffs... and you are practically seething with potential..."

The boy felt his face pale as the words began to make sense. He opened his little lips and managed to choke out, "Not Slytherin!" Then again, stronger, he hissed, "Not Slytherin!"

"Why not, boy?" the hat questioned, and unbidden the conversation with the boy on the train came back to him. The hat cackled.

"'Dark arts?'" it quoted, and the boy squirmed at the garment's blatant invasion of his thoughts. "These 'dark arts' are only dark if you use them for such things, boy, as those who have previously chosen the wrong path have. But I can see in you, boy. Your resolve to do good is strong... and your potential for such power is stronger still!"

"Not Slytherin!"

"You belong there, boy, with others of your potential and your... dark past."

And then, as he parted his lips to speak his plea again, something happened to that the boy, young and strong minded, was not accustomed to. His voice did not sound, and his mouth remained ready but motionless in the quiet hall.

Harry Potter hesitated.

"Belong?"

The word passed his lips before he had even thought his question through, and the hat jumped at the opprotunity.

"Yes, my boy. For the Sons and Daughters of Slytherin would be rejected elsewhere, scorned, even. The ones with families are known by their ancestors; the ones without are suspected, mistrusted. The sad fate that has fallen on the house of Slytherin, to bear the burden brought on by the dark wizards it has raised, was not always its role in this caastle. Once Slytherins stood as proud defenders of justice, a house of judges, it was called. Yet now... You could restore the glory days, boy!"

Harry opened his mouth, yet closed it just as fast, unsure of what to say, and for a moment he imagined the hat as a little boy, grinning, holding a gun pointed straight at Harry's chest, ready to pull the trigger and seal Harry's fate.

How appropriate this picture was.

"You have no problem with it, then?"

Harry jumped. "No, wait-"

"SLYTHERIN!"

A single word, met by the most deafening sound the boy had heard yet.

Silence.

For a moment everything was still in the Great Hall of Hogwarts; then Professor McGonagall remembered to remove the hat.

The table on the far right of the room exploded with cheers, and all doubt in Harry's mind vanished. He smiled at the professor, suddenly blind to her shell-shocked appearance, and practically ran to join his new housemates, who grinned and thumbed him on the back with a force akin to that Dudley had used when he punched a hole through the telly. Somewhere down the line upperclassmen started the chant; "We got Potter, we got Potter!" and Harry was so impressed by the joy on the faces around them that he scarcely noticed the sullen faces of those seated at the tables behind him.

As the table quieted, someone leaned down the table and waved to get his attention. For a moment Harry couldn't tell who it was, then he recognized the boy from Diagon Alley and the Train, seated between his two porky-looking friends. Harry swallowed, still expecting some sever unpleasantness to come out of the house, but all Draco Malfoy said was "Congratulations, Potter." Harry blinked, but the blond boy gave him no time to respond as he leaned back into his seat. For a moment he regarded Harry with something of a smirk, but then he turned his attention back to the sorting and Harry did, too.

Finally Professor McGonagall took the hat from the stage, the final students sorted. Harry was disappointed to see his redheaded friend-Ron Weasley-head cheerfully to the Gryffendor table and seat himself beside the girl who had fixed his glasses. Harry let himself ignore the feeling, telling himself, "You belong here, in Slytherin." He focused instead on the man who had replaced the lady Professor on the stage; harry immediately recognized the face as he felt the pentagon card he held in his pocket.

"Good evening, again, students," said Professor Dumbledore as the hall fell once more into silence. "Good evening, and welcome to another fine year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you!"

Harry stared at the headmaster uncertainly, though around him the hall erupted into cheers and applause. He leaned towards the student ahead of him on the bench, and asked quietly; "A bit odd, isn't he?"

The first year turned around and grinned-and it was the first truly pleasant grin Harry had seen in his new house. "Are you kiding me? He's a genius! My brother's told me all about him-he's a Ravenclaw-my brother, I mean! Oh, but where are my manners?" he stuck out a hand warmly. "I'm Blaise Zabini! Wretched name, but mine none the less!"  
>Harry took the hand nervously, though cheered by the boy's friendliness. "I'm-"<p>

"Harry Potter, yes! A pleasure to meet you! A bit surprised you're, well, in-well, we do get all the best! Just look at Merriweather-oh!"

Harry blinked at the boy, but quickly caught sight of what had Blaise exclaiming-and blinked again. The house tables were now lined with glistening dishes heaped with food.

"Sausages, Harry?" offered Blaise, who's own plate was already heaped with food.

Harry at last grinned and accepted the dish, forking a few onto his plate, and as he set the dish down he looked up to find the students all around him trying to pass him something different-"Peppermint Humbug, Harry?" asked one girl as he was tasting the pumpkin juice. He choked and barely avoided spewing the drink across Blaise's plate, then recovered himself and quickly rejected her offer. She shrugged. "Your loss. Creamed corn?"

This time Harry accepted the dish. "Thanks, er..."

"Pansy Parkinson. My family is quite important, you know-though I expect you wouldn't, would you, having been raised by muggles and all. "What's wrong with muggles?" Harry asked, surprised to find himself getting defensive. The boy from Diagon Alley, seated across from Pansy, stared at him.

"What's wrong with muggles?" he repeated. "What's wrong with-honestly, Potter, you don't know? I'd expect you-having experienced them first hand-"

"Well, having experienced them first hand, and now listening to you lot, I'd say there's not much difference from them and wizards, minus the magic."

"There's nothing 'wrong' with muggles," said another boy a few seats down. He was, from the looks of it, a prefect, like Ron's older brother was-though he looked even older than that. "There's nothing wrong with muggles, Potter, there's just nothing good about them either."

"My mum was muggle-born," Harry growled. The boy nodded.

"And I've heard she was an excellent witch-now don't you start, Malfoy, or else," he warned. "And a word of caution to you. Don't ever, ever insult Potter's mum or any other muggle-born around Professor Snape, Malfoy. Not only will you have to deal with him, but now that I've warned you, you'll have to deal with me."

"Adrian!" the girl on his other side exclaimed. "What have we told you about threatening the first years?"

Blaise leaned over to Harry as the older boy tuned away, hissing; "That's Adrian LaConner! I've heard bad things about him... he's gotten away with more torture of younger students-and some older, I've heard-I mean he's cursed more people than any other student at Hogwarts, and gotten away with it, too."

Harry swallowed and tried to ignore the feeling of dread that gripped his stomach. "And the girl-the girl next to him? Who's she?"

Blaise leaned forward, pretending to grab the peppermint humbug, to get a better look at her. As he returned to his seat, he had a knowing smile on his face. "Oh, that's Rose Hawthorne," he said as through it were the most obvious thing in the world. "I've met her a few times-her brother's also a Ravenclaw, friends with mine, you know. Rumor has it she's the only one who can keep LaConner in line! And she's only a third year! Her brother's always complaining about how she practically works for Professor Snape, though-her and LaConner..."

Harry quickly swallowed a mouthful of potatoes. "Who-who's Professor Snape?"

"Who-who's Snape?" Blaise chortled, and Harry saw Pansy snickering across the table.

"Who's Snape?" she repeated. "Honestly, Potter, don't you know anything about Hogwarts?"

"Not really," he said glumly, at last setting down his fork.

"Obviously not," the girl replied with a shrill laugh. "Who's Professor Snape? At least you're in Slytherin! You'll learn more here than in, say, Hufflepuff-more in a year here than you'd learn your whole time with them! Professor Snape is, of course, the Head of Slytherin, _and_ he's the potion's master."

"Potion's master!" Harry said excitedly. Of all the book's he'd looked at in his month before leaving, the potion's book looked the most interesting. Harry turned to the High Table. "Well, which one is he?"

Pansy checked. "He's talking to the professor with the turban," she began, but harry had already found him.

He was pale, and his black attire matched his long, scraggly hair. His nose was hooked, completing the nefarious air that seemed to surround him. He was very intently talking to Professor Quirrell, and even from the distance Harry could see his eyes flicking repeatedly to the purple turban he had wrapped around his head.

"He, he doesn't look very nice," he muttered to Blaise. The boy grinned.

"Oh, he's not," he assured Harry, who couldn't understand why the boy looked so happy about that. "He's the reason I wanted to be in Slytherin, though-my parents have, er... worked with him before, and he's a genius! Mean as they come, Professor Snape, and a tongue like a whip. And he's after Quirrell's job, I hear-if only Professor Dumbledor would give it to him!" He shot the headmaster a wistful glance. "But no wonder he won't! Snape's got a lot to teach about the dark art's-maybe too much.

Harry glanced again at his new housemaster, and suddenly found himself locked in gaze with the sallow man.

"Ow!" His scar throbbed dangerously.

"What's that?" Blaise asked, turning back to Harry, who quickly pretended to be fixing his bangs.

"No-nothing. Look, desert!"

The food from dinner had vanished off the table, and the golden platters were once more glimmering as though they'd never been touched, and where the heaps of meats, potatoes, and vegitables had sat now rested piles of pastries, tarts, pies, cookies, puddings, and a good deal of other sweets Harry had never even heard of before. He helped himself to a generous slice of the nearest pie-he wasn't sure what it was, though Pansy had taken some too, exclaiming, "Ooh, charbury and creamed egg!" and despite the name he found it thoroughly delicious.

The blond boy from Diagon Alley-Malfoy, Harry recalled-suddenly jumped. The seat beside him, vacant as one of his thick-looking friends had left for the bathroom, was suddenly filled by a ghost. He was exactly the same color as Dumbledore's beard. Harry, fascinated, leaned closer to get a better look-and found himself examining the silvery blood splatterings and chains with great interest.

"Evening, Baron," said Adrian cheerfully, helping himself to some rice pudding. "Have a good summer?"

"The Bloody Baron!" Blaise hissed in Harry's ear. He was so excited Harry couldn't imagine how he was managing to stay in his seat.

"I heard that, Mister Zabini," said the ghost coldly. "And it's Sir Baron to you. I had an excellent summer, LaConner-if chasing Peeves through the castle on Filch's orders rather than spending a nice vacation relaxing is what you consider to be excellent."

"I see Professor Snape's been teaching you a thing or two about sarcasm," the boy laughed. The ghost shook his head ruefully.

"On the contrary. You'd do best to remember that I was around long before Professor Snape was even a thought.

Harry turned back to Blaise. "Who's Peeves?"

"Peevers the Poltergeist," he said proudly. "He plays pranks about the castle-wouldn't cross the Baron to save his live, though." He burst into laughter, apparently finding himself quite clever. Pansy rolled her eyes and began twirling her hair in agitation.

"How is it that you know so much about Hogwarts, anyways?" she asked grumpily, her expression sour.

"Like I said, my brother-"

But the boy was cut short as the remains of desert disappeared and Dumbledore got to his feet once more. "Now that we have all eaten our fill of our kitchen's very best, he began, the candle's from the enchanted ceiling making his eyes twinkle beyond his glasses, "I have a few announcements to make. No doubt with full bellies you're all tired, yes, tired, so I'll be brief."

He paused and gazed around the room, eyes landing on faces and flicking away just as quickly as they'd come. His gaze paused, for a moment, on Harry, and it seemed to rest there longer than the others-perhaps he's imagined it, for Dumbledore looked away and carried on without hesitation.

"First, a reminder from Mr. Filch to all students that the Forbidden Forest is, in fact, forbidden to all unaccompanied youths. Although it may seem like a nice place to hide when you've set off a dung bomb or stolen the keys to Mr. Filch's office, you'd be sorely mistaken."

His eyes flashed in the direction of the Gryffendor table, and Harry wondered if it was a house of trouble makers. Before he could ask Blaise about this idea, though, the headmaster spoke again.

"Some of the students that my previous warning applies to would also do well to remember that between classes, the corridors are for traveling to your next destination though-and not for using magic in. Mr. Filch will of course, be responsible for issuing punishment to those of you who wish to ignore this." A few students laughed, and Adrian yawned loudly, only to be elbowed in the gut by Rose, a scowl on her face.

"All students interesting in playing quiddich for their houses will be pleased to know that quiddich trials will be held next week, and anyone of age may be accepted onto their house teams. However, it may be wise to contact Madame Hooch about their chances of being able to dodge a bludger before attending trials.

"And finally, the third floor corridor on the right-hand side is strictly off-limits to all students. As all doors are locked anyways, I am sure you will have no trouble following this rule; however, if you wish to die slowly and painfully, I suppose it would be in your best interest to look into some unlocking spells."

Harry stared and again muttered to Blaise-"A bit odd, isn't he?"

Before he got an answer, however, Dumbledore spoke again, this time quite excitedly. He waved his wand, which he seemed to have conjured out of nowhere, and a golden ribbon streaked out of the end, twisting itself into words. Harry quickly cleaned his glasses and stained his neck to read the floating lines.

"Everyone pick a tune and we'll sing the school song!" Professor Dumbledore exclaimed. "Here we are, one, two-"

The school erupted before the headmaster had finished, and Harry looked around in amazement. Not two people in the whole hall were singing the same song, except a pair of flaming redheads that Harry recognized from the Station. "Fred and George, Harry murmured. "Ron's brothers. And he's sitting next to... Percy the Prefect." Looking around at the hall of singing students, Harry hoped briefly that he would never have to try to remember them all.

The last singers were, in fact, the Wesley twins, who seemed quite comfortable soloing in the eyes of nearly every person in the hall. Aside from himself, Harry noticed, the only person who didn't seem to be paying any attention was Professor Snape, who, with a sour look on his face, seemed to be glaring pointedly at Dumbledore, who was too busy conducting the twins with his wand to notice.

At last the funeral march version of the school anthem was over, and Harry was glad-his vision was bleary despite his freshly cleaned glasses. As he joined the school in thunderous applause, he stifled a yawn. It had, after all, been a terribly long day.

Professor Dumbledore waited for silence to fall again before raising his voice again. "And with that, we must call it a night! Prefects, please escort your first years to your common rooms and make sure they are situated _before_ heading to bed yourselves! Goodnight!"


	2. In Which the Morning Goes South

_Well, I'll post the second bit now, because, well, I have it now. However, the 'real' action starts in the third bit. So bear with me and meet my wizards!_

It was Friday, and Harry was thoroughly excited.  
>Harry and Blaise had spent the whole week racing about the castle trying to get to their classes on time. Although he had first been impressed by Blaise's knowledge of the school, the third time the pair got caught at the door of the out-of-bounds corridor on the third floor Harry began to doubt Blaise knew Hogwarts as well as he thought he did. Mr. Norris, Filch's cat, had caught them twice already, and within two minutes Filch was on the scene to yell at them. Professor Quirrell had saved them the first time, and the Bloody Barron had the second-an unusual show of kindness. By the third, the pair had taken one look at the door and run the opposite direction, making it nearly half-way across the school before remembering they had to get to charms.<p>

However, by Friday Harry and Blaise had managed to make it to breakfast without asking directions of anyone. They sat down at the Slytherin table proudly before heaping their plates with eggs.  
>"Potions today!" Blaise exclaimed through a mouthful of toast. "We finally get to see Professor Snape in action. My brother says if you're good in potions class you can make it in any job you'd like-though I'm not sure how potions would help anyone with journalism."<p>

"Well, I suppose-" began Harry, but just then Pansy sat down across from them.

"I see you two finally managed to make to breakfast," she said with haughty look towards the boys' plates. "And you aim to eat the place dry."

Blaise swallowed and set his toast aside. "No, we're just making up for you. You know it's not healthy to starve yourself? My brother said there was a witch two years ago who tried to lose weight before a dance, and she got sent to Saint Mungo's. I heard after that she can't work any magic anymore-she became a squib all on her own!"

Harry paused through a mouthful of sausage. "A what?"

"A squib," Blaise said. "A wizard who can't use magic."

"So... a muggle, basically?"

Pansy snorted. "Hardly," she snapped. "Muggles are foul blood-at least squibs come from decent families."

Harry frowned as two identical girls sat either side of Pansy. "Good morning, Zabini, Pansy," they greeted, ignoring Harry.

Harry sighed. He found he was ignored quite a bit by the older Slytherins, but it was better than the looks he got from the other houses. Seeing them stare whenever he sat down with his housemates was utterly unnerving. He almost felt glad the Hat had taken advantage of his he023sitation, seeing them gawk at him.

"Good morning, Carrows!" replied Blaise cheerfully. "You're up early. Don't you two have first hour off?"

"Oh, we have herbology on Fridays," the one on the left-Flora-answered.

"And we heard that the first years have their first potions lesson today," said Hestia.

"So we came to give you some advice."

"Before you go making Professor Snape angry."

"Not that you stand a chance, anyways."

"Not when you're with him."

Harry ignored the prater the girls exchanged and cut in, "So how do we get on Professor Snape's good side, then?"

The one on the right-Flora-shot him a withering glare before looking back to Blaise. "So tell us, Zabini..."

"Have you read through your potions book yet?"

"Can't say I have, really," Blaise admitted, twitching as the toast in his hands grew cold. "I've been so busy with all our other classes I haven't got around to it-Professor McGonagall gave us two rolls of Transfiguration, you know that? On our first day, too! But Harry's been reading through the books all week, so he'll be able to cover me."

It was Hestia's turn to glare at Harry. "Oh, I doubt that."

"Still, Professor McGonagall's one of those that makes you glad you're not in stupid Gryffindor."

"I'd rather be a Hufflepuff."

"And that's saying something."

Pansy huffed. "Well, they're all full of mudbloods anyways," she snapped, pushing her sausage about her plate.

"Aren't you going to eat that?" Blaise asked. He was greeted with another glare.

"Flora Carrow," a voice suddenly snapped, "Have you been in my trunk again?"

The twins looked startled, and Harry twisted in his seat to see the girl behind him. It was Rose Hawthorne, the third year from the feast.

"Good morning, Rose," the twins chorused, though they seemed to be edging back in their seats.

Suddenly the older girl leaned right between Harry and Blaise, reached across the table, and tore the silver headband from Flora's hair, sending the twin's brown locks into a twisted mess. Rose brandished the band angrily. "What have I told you about touching my things, you brats?"

Harry blinked up at the black-haired girl in amazement. Until that point he had only seen her in passing across the Slytherin Common room, where she and Adrian LaConner seemed to have set up their own personal space that no-one else dared enter.

"But Rose, you left it out, and I didn't know-"

"Shut up with your little excuses; they're not fooling anyone." Rose stepped around Harry and sat down beside him, making him scoot towards Zabini uncomfortably. "Besides, you'd do well to remember that it was I who covered for the little love potion you were trying to brew in potions yesterday. I dare say getting on Professor Snape's bad side the first week of term would be a very bad move, don't you?"

The twins stared at Rose, with Pansy staring intently at her nails from between them.

"You wouldn't-"

"No, I wouldn't," Rose conceded. "However, this headband was a Christmas present. And I do hope you know that I received exactly three Christmas presents last year." She calmly heaped eggs onto the plate she had sat down at. "One, I received a book on wizard's chess from my brother, along with a goblin-crafted set. Two, I received a good deal of clothing from my Grandmother, most of which I ended up giving to the two of you anyways. And finally, I received this headband, from-"

"So you found your headband?" a new voice said, cutting off her monologue. "I was beginning to think you'd thrown it away." Adrian seated himself beside Rose, making Harry even more anxious to escape. Blaise, for some reason staring intently at the untouched piles of food on his plate, seemed not to notice Harry's discontent. "God, Carrow, what happened to your hair? Are you intending to make Slytherin look like a house of sluts?"

Flora flushed bright pink and practically jumped from her seat to run out of the hall, Hestia close behind her.

"And the sluts depart. Why are you sitting here, Rose? What would you want with that sort of filth?"

Harry hoped that she would take that as a cue to leave, but the girl just took another bite of potatoes after saying, "The first years have their first potions lessons today."

"Is that so?" Adrian suddenly stood back up and stepped right on and across the table, settling into Hestia's abandoned seat. He threw a careless arm around Pansy, who for the first time looked sincerely nervous. "And I suppose the little first years are wondering what sort of horrible-worrible things that mean old Professor Snape is going to do?"

Pansy seemed to have lost all ability to move, but Adrian wasn't even paying attention to her-he was staring right at Harry. The boy met the older student's eyes fearlessly. "Actually," he said, "I was hoping someone could tell me how to stay off his bad side."

Adrian stared at him silently for a moment, then let out a short, curt, bark of a laugh. "A brat like you?" he said deviously, and startling grin crossing his face. "Oh, this is just too cute. A brat like you honestly thinks you have a chance to not get on Snape's bad side?"

"Oh, shush up, Adrian," Rose snapped, setting down her fork. She looked at Harry with a serious expression. "Honestly, though, Potter, your chances are slim. Your best bet is to try and pretend you don't exist. The less reason you give Professor Snape to notice you, the less he will, and so the less he'll hate you."

Harry furrowed his brow. "But why would he hate me?"

Adrian burst in to harsh cackling, though it was quickly reduced to chuckling as Rose glared at him. "Adrian, you're making Miss Parkinson choke."

"My bad, my bad," he laughed. "Are you going to eat that sausage, or just play with it?"

Pansy shook her head, and Adrian took that as an offering. Grabbing her plate, he stacked it on top of his own, and used his fingers to pop the meat into his mouth. "Really, Potter," he said through his mouthful. "It's not Snape you ought to be worried about."

"What's that?" asked Harry.

Adrian smirked, narrowing his eyes so his face resembled that of a cat toying with his prey. "I'd just think twice before going wandering the halls on your own, Potter. I've been itching to test out some of the new spells I learned over the summer. Of course, a Hufflepuff would be easier to catch, but brats who actually _try_ to defend themselves are that much more interesting."

"LaConner," a soft but harsh voice snapped. "I swear I spotted someone climbing over the table a minute ago. That wouldn't have been you, would it?"

Harry made a mental note to sit on the other side of the table from then on as he turned around again. He was met with black robes, black hair,and black eyes on a pale face surrounded by black hair.

"Of course not, Professor!" said Adrian, his tone back to how it had been when he'd first addressed Rose. "Why on earth would I do something like that? On a different note, the Carrows are taking Rose's things again."

The nostrils on the hooked nose flared. "Oh?"

"And of all things," Adrian continued, grabbing the headband off the table and waving it at the professor, "They took this, this time."

Rose snatched the silver band back, and for a moment Harry could swear he saw a blush rise in her cheeks-but it must have been a trick of the light. "Adrian!" she snapped. "Now look here, she just thought it was Marjan's! You know Marjan lets the twins borrow anything."

A dark eyebrow rose. "I'm sure Miss Hawthorne can take care of herself, LaConner. As for misconduct, I'm sure you wouldn't have anything to do with Tracey Davis showing up in the Hospital Wing either. As it were, there seems to be some seeds of doubt forming among the other professors, and I'll have you come with me. You too, Miss Hawthorne."

For a moment Snape's eyes flashed down and met Harry's gaze. A sneer swept across his face-then he was gone. Adrian stood and leaped over the table once again, hurrying off down the aisle. Rose stood up much more gracefully, dusting her skirt off. She was about to leave when she turned back and looked down at Harry.

"Like I said, Potter... Remember not to exist and you'll be fine."

She swept off after the other two, her robes billowing out behind her, and Harry turned back to the table. From what he'd seen, he wouldn't have to work very hard not to exist, for Snape seemed more than willing not to acknowledge his presence. Of the three first years, only Blaise seemed to perk back up.

"Finally!" he exclaimed, shoveling the food into his waiting mouth. "I couldn't bear to eat, knowing I might have something to add to the conversation!"

After Blaise had gotten his fair share of breakfast, he and Harry hurried to gather their books and head to class, determined to make it to their first potions class on time. As it was, they managed to get lost once again, looping about the same corridor three times before finding the stairs to the dungeons. The pair sprinted into the classroom, sliding into the seats in the very back of the classroom just before Professor Snape came marching into the classroom.

Harry had a hard time focusing through Snape's introductory speech, for every time he looked down at the notes he was trying to speech he felt as though a pair of eyes were boring holes into his skull, but when he looked up all his classmates had their eyes on Snape and the Professor himself was glaring down at Ron Weasley and the boy who'd lost his toad on the train.

"Weasley!" the professor snapped angrily at one point. "Surely if your rain isn't full of sawdust you know the magical values of Unicorn blood?'

Harry started—he'd been reading about unicorn blood just the night before. He began to raise his hand, but Snape somehow caught the movement and sent a glance so piercing at Harry he wondered that there wasn't a hole going right through him.

"What's wrong?" Blaise asked in a hiss that was a bit too loud. Snape seemed to have lost his patience at that point, for he swooped down on the boy, looming over the table like and blackened pillar. "Do you have something to share, Zabini?"

Blaise flinched slightly. "No, sir."

"There will be no talking out of turn in this class." Snape did not raise his quiet voice, but he might as well have, for the silence in the classroom seemed to have increased a tenfold. "And if you continue to be a nuisance, I will have your classmates brew up some muting potions, and you will be the tester. Do you understand, Zabini?"

"Yes sir."

"Now," said Snape, wheeling about to strut forward to the front of the classroom. "Seeing as you so rudely interrupted, surely you can explain the question, Zabini?"

Zabini paused, not having listened to a word Snape had said all morning, and shook his head. "I'm sure Harry could, though," he added hopelessly.

Harry flinched, knowing he was in for it now. Snape's eyes finally settled on Harry. "Ah yes," the man murmured, lack eyes narrowing further. "Our new celebrity. Surely one of your fame could tell us the uses of unicorn blood?"

Harry squirmed, wishing he could just make himself invisible. "It can…" he stammered, trailing off.

"Yes?"

"It can keep someone from dying—for a short time, at least."

Snape's mouth twisted into an un-amused grimace. "Then I suppose you could tell us what the uses of the horn and the hair are, Potter?"

"No, sir," Harry admitted. He'd only read the bit about blood because of the image that had gone with it—a dreadful wraith that had survived too long off the blood. Looking at the contempt growing on Snape's face, Harry could have sworn the professor knew just what he was thinking. "Pity," the man said. "Boomslang skin?"

"No, sir."

"Essence of Dittany?"

"No, sir," Harry said again, but this time he nodded towards the Gryffindor girl Hermione Granger, who was practically falling out of her seat as she stretched her hand as high as she could into the air. "But I think she does, sir."

Snape shot Harry the darkest glare he'd given him yet and pivoted about, snapping to Hermione, "Sit down, you stupid little girl." He reached the front of the classroom fuming. "Boomslang skin, taken from the boomslang snake is used in the polyjuice potion, along with lacewing flies. Essence of Dittany prevents scarring, as any half-minded wizard should know." Suddenly he wheeled about, glaring at them all. "Why aren't you copying this down?"

Harry felt it was most unfair indeed, that Professor Snape would expect them to know on their first day of class all of these complicated ingredients. However, as the students were sent about trying to make a simple boils-cure potion, he found himself increasingly glad he was not a Gryffindor. Every chance Snape got his swooped in and criticized the Gryffindors's attempts, from the color of Neville Longbottom's brew to the chopping methods Dean Thomas was employing, which were no more effective than "blindly swinging at the ingredients with a mace." And Snape seemed to almost enjoy taking away points from the Gryffindors at every chance he got.

In a sense, belonging to Snape's House protected him from this sort of blatant hatred, Harry found himself thinking. He may not be on the Potions Master's good side—if there was one—but at least Snape wouldn't go around taking away points from his own House.

Suddenly Neville and Seamus' cauldron burst into flames, sending bits of their potion everywhere. The first years shrieked and pulled back, not knowing what to do, but Snape strode forward and with a flick of his wand reduce the firestorm to a tiny ball, which with a wave of his sleeve he blew out. "Idiots!" the Professor cried, indicating the heap of twisted metal that had been the pair's cauldron. "Did you not hear me say specifically to take the cauldron off the fire before adding the quills? Typical Gryffindors. Ten points from each of you."

Neville and Seamus stood by helplessly, their faces covered in red boils, as Snape waved his wand again, pulling the splattered potion off the floor and levitating it to the nearest sink, where it bubbled slowly down the drain. "Well, don't just stand there!" the teacher snapped. "Get yourselves to the infirmary! I'm sure you know where it is."

Harry looked glumly down into his potion, which had turned to a sickening, tar-like black sludge once he added his snakes' fangs. Snape, seeming to sense his deflation, descended on him next, and a satisfied smirk crossed his face as he looked in. "Pathetic," he said simply, and sent Harry's potion to join Neville and Seamus' in the sink.

As Harry set about helping Blaise stew his horned slugs, he decided he might not be liking potions much, after all.


	3. In Which Harry Turns To Quickly

_Sorry about the wait! Just got back from a month on the east coast and finally kicked my ass into gear to write this. A bit shorter than the other two, but with a bit more happening, and I've already got a head start on the next chapter. Thank you for all your kind comments, and I sincerely apologize for some very odd typos; when I get the chance I'll go back and fix them. Anyone with critique, please, please share: I'm sure nothing short of pure flaming will insult me and I have heard from some trustworthy sources that my writing occasionally puts them to sleep (?) which is absolutely heartbreaking but also something I definitely want to fix!_

_With that, enjoy!_

"He really seemed to hate me."

It was Friday afternoon, and Harry was seated in a massive armchair in Hagrid's hut. The man poured Harry tea into a chipped mug and offered him another rock cake.

"Rubbish!" said Hagrid, not quite meeting Harry's eyes. "Why should he?"

"Hagrid, the other students have been complaining all day about how Professor Snape favors the Slytherins. He didn't favor us at all-at least not Blaise and I!"

Blaise, who was examining a plant in the window, added off-offhandedly, "Well, he did seem a bit off."

"Now look here, Harry," said Hagrid. "Yeh've got more to worry 'bout than that Snape's bad moods, what wit' school an' all. He hardly likes any of the students, in any case. Yeh just put it out of yer mind."

"But Hagrid, I'm-" Suddenly a piece of paper sticking out from under the tea cozy caught Harry's eye. It was a cutting from the _Daily Prophet._ "'Gringotts Break-in Latest?" Harry read.

"But Hagrid, I thought Gringotts was impossible to break into! And look! It was on my birthday! It might've been happening while we were there, even."

Hagrid didn't seem at all pleased by the change in topic. He grunted, not meeting Harry's eyes, and offered him another rock cake, forgetting that Harry had already rejected seconds. Harry read it again-_The vault that was searched had in fact been emptied earlier that same day._

Hagrid cleared his throat. "Weren't you telling me about the old git Filch's cat, Blaise?"

"Hm?" Blaise turned away from the window. "Oh, yes! She's the sneakiest little devil, you know that? The other day she found us in front of the forbidden corridor-"

"And what'er yeh two doing up at that corridor?"

"We got lost!" Harry assured him.

"Yes, we've had a terrible time this whole week," agreed Blaise. "Quirrel and the Bloody Baron have had to save us twice from Mrs. Norris and Filch already. It's not like we mean to end up at that door!"

"Well, yeh two ought to pay close mind to Dumbledor's rules. Ther theh fer a reason." Hagrid glanced out the window. "Speakin' uh which, 'ts nearly lunch time. Yer supposed to eat wit yer house, yeh know that."

Despite Harry's protests (for Hagrid's cabin was a much friendlier place than the Slytherin table), Blaise and he were quickly hurried out of the hut, and with a loud thunk Hagrid shut the door behind them.

As Harry and Blaise hurried back to the castle, Harry noticed how quite his friend was. "Feeling alright?" he asked as they entered the open stone hall.

"Fine," Blaise replied. The word came out harshly, and for a moment Blaise looked like he was going to snap further at Harry, but then he smiled brightly as ever. "Those rock cakes were right impossible, yeah? I think I chipped a tooth... it hurts terribly."

Harry frowned, trying to remember if Blaise has so much as sniffed the food Hagrid had forced on them, but he had been paying too much attention to Hagrid to recall. "Should you go to the hospital?"

Blaise laughed. "No, I'll just find my brother later. He used to get in fights all the time, so he learned how to fix all sorts of little things like this on his own."

"Your brother got in fights?" said Harry with a frown. "But I thought he was a Ravenclaw?"

"He is, he is! But he's the same year as Adrian, and had a bad way of running into him whenever he was in a foul mood-which was oftener, you know, before Rose came."

"Funny," said Harry, "I thought only Gryffindors and Draco's lot got in fights."

The pair entered the Great Hall and sat down at the nearest seats. The sixth-years they'd squeezed in between barely shot them glances before returning to their meals. "Well, you know what they say," said Blaise. "A Slytherin has an idea, a Gryffindor's there to shoot it down, beat 'em up, and take credit for it after all that."

"They sound like a bunch of gits, but... Isn't that how Crabbe and Goyle got their Transfiguration homework done?"

"Well, I didn't say that _all_ of us have great ideas. But we're the house where the true potential goes. All the Gryffindors get is 'courage.' What good is courage if you're no good, anyways? Don't need courage if you know you've got the skills."

"So Slytherin is the 'skilled' house?" asked Harry. "I thought the sorting hat said 'cunning.'"

"We've been doing better than everyone else so far, haven't we?"

Harry paused, mouth half filled with asparagus. "We have?"

Blaise didn't answer, and they stopped talking so he could get a bite to eat.

Just as Harry finished, Rose walked past, apparently on her way out, but she halted abruptly and sat down across from the boys. "Hello, Rose," greeted Harry, as Blaise was still eating.

"Hello, Potter, Zabini," she replied, but she sat quite still after that, studying Harry intensely. Harry didn't know what to say.

"Is there something on my face?"

She frowned. "No, nothing in particular."

Harry stared back at her. He was beginning to get familiar with her fox-like face; her sharp nose, scrutinizing green eyes, and tight-lipped mouth stretched into a thin, straight line. Her wavy black hair was today pulled back, leaving her bangs to frame her face.

"Rose," Harry asked abruptly, question forming before he had a chance to think about what he was saying. "Are you at all related to Professor Snape?"

Well, at least she stopped studying him. Rose's harsh expression was replaced with one of bewilderment. "I'm sorry," Harry quickly amended. "It's just, you look a bit like—"

She waved him off. "I suppose we both have black hair," she said skeptically, purposefully glancing at Harry's own black head-full, "but I dare say I take far better care of my appearances than Professor Snape does, Potter. It's not as though black hair is unusual."

"I'm sorry," said Harry again. "It just kind of came out."

This earned him a reproachful look. "I suppose I am related to him in some way or another—but it's so distant I dare say there'd be no resemblance. No more so than I'd have to you, or Zabini, anyways." Harry blinked and looked at Blaise who, with his tidy brown hair and bright-eyed face, couldn't possibly be related to him, or Rose or Snape, for that matter. The boy was just finishing himself, and took a long drink of pumpkin juice and dabbed his mouth with a napkin before turning to Harry.

"I'd say Rose looks more like yourself, Harry," he said after studying his friend's face for a moment. Harry blinked at Rose, who shook her head in disbelief.

"Really, you two, you ought to think before you speak!" she snapped. Harry was startled by her sudden change of mood, but he was growing more than used to short tempers in the Slytherin house.

"No, I'm serious," began Blaise, but Harry elbowed him heartily until he shut up.

"Rose," he cut in, "aren't you going to eat?" She frowned and looked at the table, as if just now noticing the platters heaped with turkey and potatoes and—and whatever that was spread out before her. Blaise stood up, apparently not interested in sitting through her meal.

"Well, I'm off to find my brother," he said, slinging his book bag over his shoulder. "I'll see you back at the common room, Harry."

"Yeah, bye." Harry turned back to Rose, who had begun piling enough food on her plate to feed five people her size. "You're going to eat all that?" he asked before clamping a hand over his mouth."

Rose gave him the sourest look he had ever seen, even counting the sneer Snape had given him when he turned the potion black. Harry felt his ears burn with humiliation as she asked, "Don't you have anything better to be doing?," and he practically ran out of the Great Hall.

_Really, Harry, just learn to keep your mouth shut, _he thought bitterly as he headed down the stairs. He was so distracted by his stupidity as he rounded the corner he ran straight into someone—a very tall someone in Slytherin robes. Harry fell flat on his back and looked up into a pair of very angry grey eyes.

Adrian's lip curled as he looked down at the first year stammering apologies, and waved his hand to silence the boy. "Oh be quiet, Potter," he snapped. "Your yammering is giving me a headache." He reached down, offering a hand up, which Harry stared at, uncertain of what to do, before realizing how stupid it would be to refuse a hand from Adrian LaConner. The Head Boy smiled and pulled Harry up, but did not let go of his hand.

"Be sure to pay attention where you're walking in the future, Potter," he said in an almost gentle voice. "Oh, and… _flagrate nexus."_

For a moment Harry was confused, until he realized his hand was glowing and, a moment later, burning! Harry yelped, yanking his arm out of the older boy's grip, and swatted out the tiny flames that had started on his sleeve. For a moment he cradled his hand, wide-eyed as blisters formed in the shape of Adrian's hand, before he realized he should be looking at his upperclassman. It was too late, though; Adrian had his wand out.

"_Locomotor Potter!"_

Harry suddenly found his body being lifted into the air and flew back fifty paces into the wall at the end of the corridor. He cringed as he slid down, but scrambled to his feet and rounded the corner, running. The only problem was he had never gone this way before, and had no clue where he was running to! He turned as soon as he could and found himself scrambling up a narrow stairway.

"Come back here, Potter!" he heard Adrian shout behind him. Coming out in a deserted hallway, he pulled out his wand, knowing he'd have to defend himself against. But how? Harry hid behind the corner of the next hall over, out of breath, as he pondered this. The only spells he knew were, well, _wingardium leviosa,_ which he'd not quite managed despite the hour Blaise had spent explaining to him exactly what he was doing wrong, and _lumos_. Harry doubted that transfiguring a person would be quite the same as turning a toothpick into a needle, and besides, he had only really manages to make his a bit shinier in the whole class time they'd been given. So unless he was planning to blind Adrian with an overly bright _lumos—_that was it!

Harry spun out from around the corner, pointed his wand at the flickering lantern on the ceiling, and shouted with as much might as he could muster, "_Nox!"_

The lights flickered out, and Harry was encased in darkness. He turned and ran down the hall without a clue as to where he was, or even which floor he was on. He glanced over his shoulder and saw the dim glow of Adrian's _lumos_ spell as the boy chased after his footsteps, but couldn't see his own hands in front of him. Or, for that matter, Professor Snape as he stepped out of the seventh-year potions classroom. With a thud Harry found himself sprawled on the floor for the second time that evening.

Snape drew his wand from his cloak and waved it vaguely at the ceiling, illuminating the hallway to find Adrian rushing towards him. He raised an eyebrow.

"LaConner," he called, as the head boy quickly slowed. "Why, exactly, are the lights in my hallway out?"

"Don't ask me," said Adrian. "He's the one who did it."

Snape's other eyebrow joined the first. He shot Harry an unreadable glance, which quickly turned into a frown and a creased brow as he looked back at Adrian. "And what's that you've done to Potter's hand?" he asked. "_Furnunclus?_"

At this Adrian grinned, almost looking proud. "Professor, Professor… I wouldn't settle for something I knew worked!" he assured Snape gleefully. "It was one of my own hybrids, of course… _flagrate nexus."_

Snape shook his head. "You're going to damage your own hands that way, LaConner." Adrian shrugged non-chalantly.

"Rose can fix them."

"Not if I tell her not to." Snape spun around, and for a moment, Harry thought he was going to leave him there with Adrian. But as he scrambled up, he heard the professor snap, "Potter! With me." He quickly chased after the man.


	4. In Which Snape Dreams

_Oh wow, I did not expect to finish this chapter so quickly. I really owe it to Snape; Rowling described him as a "gift of a character" and I must confess he is fascinating—if challenging—to write. On that note, there is a bit of a POV change here; it is one of the key differences I'm aiming at from the style of the books. I really feel that it would be worthless to tell this story focusing solely on Harry, as that's been done in the main series already. Although my Harry will grow in a different manner from the canon Harry, he is still a well known character. Unlike Rowling, I don't have the benefit of using vagueness on characters like Snape, as you already know where his initial loyalties lie. So, I'd like to explore his character—and the character of others in the series—a little more freely than Rowling ever really did. Besides, it's fanfiction._

_To Pigfarts-It's On Mars, I'd first like to ask: What do you want with a rocket ship? What business do you have on Mars? But in all sincerity, thank you very much for your kind words and observations! This chapter might leave you with a bit more guessing about Rose, but it'll be a few more before you know for sure what her role in all of this is._

_To Cyiusblack: Well, I hope this was fast enough!_

_And now that I've bored you lot to death, Enjoy!_

When he caught Harry Potter's eye, the world came crashing down around him.

He saw in those emerald green eyes the same light he had seen in that girl in the park, all those years ago. The student in the halls of Hogwarts. The blushing bride on the water-warped invitation.

Everything could have been different-with a word. A single word that tore Lily Evans away from him.

His Lily.

If only he hadn't been Slytherin-if only she hadn't been Gryffindor! What would life had been like, if she—

Oh, no, with James Potter about, Lily Evans would never have loved someone like _him_ back.

But if Potter had never come to Hogwarts-Had never been born! What then?

He could see it, yes, the vision came to him again! The little girl dancing up the stepping-stone path, long red hair fanned out behind her, up to the steps of the cottage, where Lily-his Lily!-had eyes for him, him alone—

And with a jolt the vision cut off, and here he was, staring into the eyes of Harry, Harry _Potter_.

Severus Snape tore his gaze away, back to the pale contour of the stammering Professor Quirrel. This would be a long year at Hogwarts, he knew. His eyes rested on the purple turban, a bored resignation settling over him. The foul stench of old garlic cloves and something else—metal? rust?—was seeping from the fool as he yammered on beside him. Snape hadn't a clue what Quirrel was going on about. The stench was enough to make the Potions Master's head throb-or was that the vision, still? He downed his glass of pumpkin juice angrily, slamming it into the table with such force Quirrel jumped nearly a foot into the air, upturning his plate and spilling gravy down the front of Snape's black robes.

The Potions Master sneered in disgust, but merely waved his hand and banished the whole mess back to the kitchens. Quirrel jumped again, as though the magic were unexpected, and stammered out apologies that Snape ignored. He hated the man, both for his irritable mannerisms and for holding the class he'd rather teach-Defense Against the Dark Arts. The fool could barely stammer out a coherent sentence, let alone teach the students to defend themselves.

His head throbbed again-like a plea to look back into that dammed boy's beautiful eyes. No, he wouldn't look, for looking would be like staring into the face of his failure. Just as he could see her in the child, Snape also found _him... _Potter. The man who had taken everything from Snape. Snape would not taunt himself by looking back to the messy black hair, the round-rimmed glasses. He had lived eleven years waiting, waiting for Lilly's son, and he would not let Potter's genes ruin it. Besides, he had more important things to worry about.

Like how Lily's son had ended up in Slytherin, for example.

Five days later found Snape in his office. He had taken an early breakfast, and had returned to his office to read a letter from an old student regarding a suspicious sounding potion. Truthfully, Snape was dawdling. He rather despised teaching first-years, who couldn't tell the difference between stirring clockwise and counterclockwise.

A knock on the door disrupted his review of the supposed effects of the potion. Snape sighed and set the letter down. He waved his hand, and the door to his office opened.

Professor McGonagall stormed in, dragging a first-year girl by the wrist. Snape raised an eyebrow as he recognized the Slytherin tie around her neck, but she had her face hidden in her free arm. "Can I help you, Minerva?" the Potions Master asked, looking back up to his colleague. She had her most furious expression on, and if he didn't know better Snape would almost have called her hair askew.

"Your _protégé_, Severus," she snapped. Snape waited for her to continue, though she expected him to have understood. McGonagall sighed. "Davis!" she snapped, pulling the girl forward. "Show him your face!" She tried to pull the arm away, but the girl pushed her away.

Snape sighed and stepped around the desk. He was not so gentle as McGonagall; he grabbed the girl and tilted her head up, pulling the arm away forcefully. Much to his disgust, Tracy Davis, a first year, looked up at him with red-rimmed eyes. Her face was covered with boils.

Brilliant. A wonderful way to begin the year, dealing with boils. Snape pushed the girl into his desk chair and walked out into the hallway, pulling out his want. "_Accio_," he muttered, and a door fifty feet down slammed open, allowing for a vial of pale pink liquid to speed to his hand.

"Severus, this can't go on!" McGonagall insisted as he returned to the office. Snape ignored her and uncorked the vial, thrusting it towards the frightened first-year, who blanched.

"Drink this," he ordered. "_Now._" Once he was sure the girl had taken it all, he turned back to the furious Gryffindor Head. "Where did you find her?"

"I was passing the Hospital Wing. Poppy didn't have any of the potion on hand," McGonagall explained. "Severus, you know who did this."

Snape raised an eyebrow, sweeping back around his desk. "Unless you are suggesting that _I_ hexed the girl, Minerva," he drawled, "No, I am afraid I don't."

"Don't play dumb with me!"

A pair of students passed by the door, and Snape realized he hadn't shut the potions' storage room. He waved his hand and heard it slam shut, followed shortly by the squeals as the students jumped away. Snape looked down at Davis, whose boils were beginning to recede, and back to McGonagall. "Make your point, Minerva."

The Professor slammed her hands on the desk, upsetting the Potions Master's tea. "_LaConner_, Severus!" she shouted. "Has Dumbledore not made it _expressly_ clear that you are to keep him in control?"

Snape sighed. "Davis," he asked the frightened girl. "Who hexed you?" She shook her head, looking more and more like she wanted to disappear into the seat.

"I don't know, sir," she choked out. Snape turned back to McGonagall.

"There you have it, Minerva. None the less—" he continued before she could insist otherwise, "None the less I will have a word with Mr. LaConner, if that would ease your agitation."

McGonagall straightened up, glaring at Snape. "If you don't, _Professor_," she snapped, "I'm sure Dumbledore would just love an explanation of why you suddenly can't handle your own students." She spun around, intending to leave, but caught sight of the frightened first year. "For God's sake, Davis, stop your blubbering!" The door slammed behind the professor, leaving Snape staring at it blankly.

After a long minute, he sighed. Adrian LaConner was the last person he wanted to deal with before teaching first years. Besides, it wasn't like Dumbledore would fire him if he didn't control his students. It was only to humor the old man that he'd even accepted the role of Slytherin House Head. Still, an angry McGonagall was almost as frightening as the thought of the angry letters that would come in if the parents heard about his Head Boy cursing the younger students. He stood and made for the Great Hall, leaving Tracy Davis in his office without a word.

Snape entered the dining hall in the height of breakfast. It was loud and crowded—exactly why he hated it. There was nothing worse than facing the swarms of idiot children this early in the morning. By dinner the Professor usually had enough energy to cast a quieting spell, but when he skipped out on dining in the main hall Dumbledore always had some other reason to call him into his office and just happened to notice his absence at the dinner table—and what sort of example was that setting for his students? Annoyed, the Potions Master scanned his house table for the biggest pain his house had ever produced.

Adrian LaConner wasn't a typical Slytherin. There were the usual requirements to being in the house of Salazar, sure—cunning, clever, and cruel, LaConner appeared the epitome of a Slytherin. Yet he didn't fall in the usual categories that fell into the house. He wasn't obsessed with blood status, for one—considering he had no clue who his father was, that was no surprise. He wasn't among the haughty, rich Slytherin elite, not by way of his mother's family being poor—they were, in fact, quite well off—or the lonely, unaccepted orphans of the war.

No, maybe it was more appropriate to say that Adrian LaConner wasn't a typical student at Hogwarts. After all, his cruelty wasn't based on any specific ideal.

Adrian LaConner was just cruel.

At last Snape caught sight of the boy, leaping over the table to settle in the seat next to another frightened first year girl. He saw the Carrow twins rushing out of the hall, and when he looked back the Head Boy had his arm around the girl. Snape sighed and stalked over, not at all pleased.

"LaConner," he growled as he approached the table. The boy perked up, an almost _pleased_ expression rising into his face. "I swear I spotted someone climbing over the table a minute ago. That wouldn't have been you, would it?" The first years seated across from Adrian—and beside Rose—turned around.

_Of course it was Potter. It just had to be Potter._

The Head Boy grinned. "Of course not, Professor! Why on earth would I do something like that?" Snape was about ready to strangle him, but Adrian quickly changed subject. "On a different note, the Carrows are taking Rose's things again."

Snape narrowed his eyes and looked down at Rose, who was glaring at Adrian. This irritated Snape even further—if Adrian hadn't brought it up, she probably would have never mentioned it. He wasn't sure which annoyed him more, that he wouldn't have heard of it or that he had. He took a deep breath, trying to reign in his temper. "Oh?"

Adrian grinned and snatched something from the table beside Rose. "And of all things," he continued on gleefully, "They took this, this time!"

Rose grabbed the object back, but not quickly enough. Snape had seen what it was: a silver headband, precisely the one LaConner and himself had given her for Christmas the year before. "Adrian!" Rose snapped, probably too embarrassed to face the Professor. "No look here, she just thought it was Marjan's! You know Marjan lets the twins borrow anything!"

Snape's eyebrow shot up: he would have thought Adrian's gift of making excuses would have rubbed off on her by now, but apparently not. "I'm sure Miss Hawthorne can take care of herself, LaConner. As for misconduct," he continued quickly, not letting Adrian cut in, I'm sure you wouldn't have anything to do with Tracey Davis showing up in the Hospital Wing either. As it were, there seems to be some seeds of doubt forming among the other professors, and I'll have you come with me." Snape had learned not to give anyone a chance to protest when he spoke; it would only drag out the conversation. "You too, Miss Hawthorne."

Though he meant to turn and walk out of the infernal hall as quickly as he had come, something made Snape glance down at the Potter boy, his bright green eyes gazing up at him—

—_the laughing girl, dancing around to show Lily her new Hogwarts robes, Lily's smile—_

The house head grimaced and tore his gaze from Lily's eyes. What a cruel world, to put those eyes on that dismal face. Snape's head throbbed as he stormed from the hall, the sound of laughter echoing all around him. He rushed towards the dungeons, anxious for a calming draught to ease his nerves.

The unfortunate first year was still in his office, the boils on her face nearly gone. "Out!" Snape snarled, storming around to pull open the drawer to his desk. He dug through the pile of papers until he found a small vial containing a blue-tinted liquid. Snape glared at it—there was barely a few drops left, less than he put in his tea when he had to deal with homesick first years. The tea from earlier had by now soaked into the papers on his desk, so he tapped the liquid directly into his mouth—disgusting, considering its sickening sweetness—and squeezed the vial, crushing it into dust.

Rose and Adrian entered moments later. The boy flung himself into the chair his victim had abandoned just minutes earlier, while Rose inspected the mess on the desk. "You've made a terrible mess of these papers, Severus," she said calmly, drawing out her wand. "_Tergeo._"

Snape watched coolly as the tea seeped out of the page and rolled back into the cup, which the girl sat upright on his desk again. "Now why," he asked as the girl pulled back the other chair and sat daintily in it, "Would you not mind your manners as Miss Hawthorne does, LaConner?"

The boy feigned surprise. "But Professor!" he insisted, making his eyes as wide as he could. "I don't understand what you're talking about. Rose here has taught me all the proper manners, hasn't she? How to stand with good posture, how to sip tea—"

Rose rolled her eyes, apparently not caring for the ladylike role Adrian had assigned her. "As if you ever _sip_ your tea, Adrian." Snape glared at her, and the pair shut up.

"Attacking first years in the halls, LaConner," Snape said, slowly enough to keep his voice at a reasonable volume. "Is not good manners."

Adrian snorted unpleasantly. "It's not _my_ fault Davis didn't pay attention when Rose told the first years not to travel alone!"

"So you did do it!" Rose exclaimed. "Adrian!"

The head boy slumped back in his seat, a cross expression on his face. "Well who did you expect?" he muttered. "Pucey? Flint?"

Snape rubbed his temples. His head hadn't stopped throbbing since he looked into that damned boy's eyes—Lily's eyes. This was getting ridiculous. "Mr. LaConner," he began. "While you seem to think you stand above the rules, I'm sure Miss Hawthorne would be more than willing to explain just how wrong you are. As it were, it is not Miss Hawthorne who has to deal with your antics, but myself. Your expulsion from Hogwarts is the last thing you want for your future, Mr. LaConner, and I will not vouch for you any more this year. You are an adult, Mr. LaConner, and if your antics lead to anything that would result in charges being pressed, I will be among those testifying—against you. I'm sure Miss Hawthorne will be next in line behind me. Do I make myself clear?"

Adrian muttered something under his breath, then leapt from his chair as the teacup went flying towards him from the table. Snape glowered at the boy, but kept his voice level as he asked again.

"Do I make myself clear?"

The boy sat down again. "Yes, Professor."

Rose rolled he eyes, waving her want at the broken cup. "_Reparo. Tergeo._" She turned back to the desk, where once again she levitated the cup to. "You two are such boys," she muttered, replacing her wand.

"You're just such a girl."

"Is that supposed to be an insult, Adrian?"

Snape waved his hand, silencing them again. "As it were, Miss Hawthorne," he growled, "We have a matter to discuss as well."

"We do, sir?"

His irritation rose again and with a flick of his wand the headband was out of her book bag and on the desk. Rose flushed.

"Really, Severus," she insisted, "As you said, I can take care of myself."

"Clearly you cannot take care of your own things, if it were so easy for Miss Carrow to just pluck this away from you."

The girl's shoulders stiffened. "What would you have me do, Severus?" she demanded. "Keep it under lock and key?"

Snape sighed. He wasn't altogether sure what he expected the girl to have done. The headband spun around midair, where he had left it. It was a simple thing, really. Silver, like most of Rose's jewelry, and a small silver rose on one side. When she'd received it, she'd been almost as embarrassed as Snape, who had reluctantly added his name to the card at Adrian's insistence.

The school bells rang, disturbing his thought, and Snape stood. "I'm sure Mr. LaConner would be more than happy to show you a few protection wards." Adrian sat up straighter, and an interested expression crossed Rose's face.

"Are you suggesting I hex the girls, Severus?" she asked. "Not very Professor-like if you ask me."

Snape shook his head. "I said nothing of the sort, Miss Hawthorne," he said calmly. Apparently the draught was beginning to take effect. "Don't you have Herbology?" He handed her the headband.

The girl sighed and stood, calmly opening the door and walking away. Adrian stayed put, watching the Professor. "Do you have something to say, LaConner?" Snape asked. He had spoken too soon—his head throbbed again.

The head boy shrugged and stood. He was taller than Snape, and skinny yet formidable in appearance. "Not really," he said nonchalantly. "But I hope you didn't use the last of your boil curing potion on Davis, though I doubt the Carrows would come to you for help."

He slunk out of the room, leaving Snape shaking lividly from behind his desk.

"He's just like his father," Snape snapped, pacing about. "Never mind that he's in Slytherin. Arrogant, rude..."

"Are you sure, Severus, that these are not just the traits you with to see in the boy?" asked Dumbledore. Behind his spectacles, the old man's eyes twinkled. While for the rest of the staff the start of the year was one long day of hard work after the other, Dumbledore had a way of being even more full of energy. It was almost as though the headmaster found running the only Wizarding School in Britain less a job and more a game. "Sit down, Severus," he urged. "You're making me dizzy."

Snape scowled and flung himself into the chair Dumbledore had conjured for him, ignoring that he was beginning to act like Adrian had in his office earlier that day. He glared at the man, who seemed quite content to suck on a lemon drop while his Potions Master fumed.

"I take it, then," the old man said finally, studying Snape's expression, "That young Mr. Potter is not in fact a potions protégé?"

Snape's scowl deepened and he strummed his fingers on the arm of his chair in agitation. "Just tell me this," he demanded. "How did the famous Harry Potter, born champion those fighting the dark arts, end up in Slytherin house?"

Dumbledore smiled. "But you've already said it, Severus," he said cheerfully. "Those accepted into the house of Salazar Slytherin always share a few traits with the man, such as a certain disregard for the rules, yes?" But the man's face quickly turned serious. "However, this turn of events, shall we say… is certainly unexpected. What with his parent the proud Gryffindors they were, in all honestly I think most of us just assumed that's where the son would belong. No," he looked thoughtful. "I think it would, perhaps, be more correct to assume that young Mr. Potter received more than just a scar from Lord Voldemort—do you know what type of wand his is, Severus?"

"No."

Dumbledore stood and crossed the office, descending the stairs to the perch of a glorious orange and gold bird, preening itself daintily. It chirped as the old man rubbed its neck, reaching its head forward to gaze back into the headmaster's gaze. "Mr. Ollivander saw fit to send me a letter when Harry and Hagrid left the store. He found it most curious, most curious indeed that this particular wand would choose the boy. Eleven inches, holly, with a phoenix tail feather at its core." The headmaster returned to his seat. "Fawkes," he continued, nodding to the bird, "only ever gave two feathers, Severus, and the other remains in the wand of Lord Voldemort."

A chill went down Snape's spine and he straightened up slightly. "You mean to say," he hissed at last, "that sooner than later _Lily Evan's son_ is going to be walking these halls cursing muggleborns? That _Harry Potter_ is going to be preaching blood status?"

"I said nothing of the sort," corrected Dumbledore. "No, Severus, I merely mean to imply that when Lord Voldemort failed to kill young Harry he may have transferred to the child some of his powers—and power, as you know, is the one thing Salazar Slytherin valued most."

"You still believe the Dark Lord will return, then?" Snape asked. Dumbledore sighed; it was a topic they'd discussed many times before. "If he does, headmaster, if he does return and finds Harry Potter a _Slytherin_… what then?"

"What then indeed? But you of all people should know: just because the boy is in Slytherin doesn't mean there isn't goodness in his heart. Slytherins are wise, Severus. They are resourceful and clever, and when the occasion calls for it, they can be cunning and cruel. But they are also masters of self-preservation. How else would you have lasted this long, Severus? No, if anything young Mr. Potter has made your life easier."

"And how is that, headmaster?"

"He will face all the hatred of the families most affected by Lord Voldemort. He will learn what he is fighting against, and he will learn to protect himself. He will learn to think before he acts." Dumbledore sighed. Although he was telling Snape of the benefits of Slytherin, he had a troubled look on his face.

"You expect a child to be able to stand accountable for the whole of the war?" questioned Snape. "Even if he has his father's arrogance, do you really expect a boy to be able to face the results of such a complicated and dividing war?"

"No, no… let him be a child while he still can be," said Dumbledore. "And _Professor_, it is your job to make sure he can be."

Snape started. _His job?_ "Headmaster I thought we had agreed long ago I would remain in the shadows—"

"Circumstances have changed, Severus." Dumbledore's voice was suddenly harsh. He was not the rambling old man from the welcoming feast, but rather the commanding presence of Hogwarts' master. "Mr. Potter has been placed in Slytherin House—not by any will of mine or yours, but by something neither of us could control. Now that he is there as head of Slytherin it is your duty to make sure the boy is raised properly." He glared down Snape's protests. "I'm sure you're well aware that Mr. Potter has been in the care of his aunt Petunia Dursley's family, and it has not left him the spoiled brat you expected."

Snape shook his head. "I will not be Potter's _caretaker_, headmaster," he said coolly. His voice, though never raised, had a definitive edge to it. "And if that is a problem then you'd best find yourselves a new head of Slytherin." With that, he stood and swept out of the office, not allowing for another word on the matter.

Severus Snape liked to think himself a controlled man. He rarely raised his voice, even when seething with anger, nor did he seek to discuss the trivial matters of day-to-day life in a dramatic fashion. Rather, he kept calm and quiet, showing only enough anger to make his point perfectly clear to the poor fool who had annoyed him. It was not like him to fling teacups or shatter vials. He was not known for storming out of the great hall or shouting at first years.

It had been a very bad morning. The Potions Master stood over a cauldron in the seventh-year laboratory, stirring with an unprofessional vigor that splashed the silver liquid up the sides, singing a hole in his cloak where it landed.

Potter. Since that boy had arrived at Hogwarts, Snape had yet to regain his cool. Since that first night in the Great Hall, the nagging thought at the back of his mind had been growing, like a thorn in his side or a rock in his shoe it lingered in the background. Since Snape first laid eyes on the boy, walking so meekly up to the Sorting Hat, he had seen the _Potter_ in him; the bold James Potter that didn't know how cruel he was. It was in his hair, his face, his glasses—

But the eyes. Lily's eyes.

…_walking down the streets of Muggle London, late in the evening. Lily liked to find little escapes, places where no one would recognize them. Where would they dine tonight? Would they sip fine wine and laugh as they told stories about their days? Would they find comfort in the intimacy of their shared gifts, delighting each other with little pieces of magic when there was no one looking? They had time, so much time, just the two of them…_

Snape gasped and leaned over the cauldron. "Oh, Lily," he whispered. What sort of world was he imagining, where nothing mattered but the two of them? She would have laughed at the foolishness of the thought, or told him off for avoiding the real matter at hand.

A tear slid down the man's cheek and rolled off, falling into the cauldron. For a moment, it hissed and slid into a dark swirl in the metallic sheen. It looked almost beautiful. The interlocking swirls turned, growing thinner and thinner—and then the darkness spread. A second later, the potion was black, a dark and watery substance that was useless to his cause.

Snape sighed and banished the mess, stepping back. He would have to try again tomorrow, for brewing a Calming Draught required the precise timing, the addition of ingredients at midnight and stirring for twenty minutes, and he had neither the ingredients nor the energy to start once more. With a wave of his hand the lights flickered out, and Severus Snape stepped out into the black hallway.


	5. In Which the Room is Cleaned

_Okay, okay, I resolved the 'cliff-hanger.' I actually only ended up covering about half the plot progression I had intended to in this chapter—I'm good at misjudging lengths—but I figured I'd separate it into two separate chapters once it got this long. Hopefully I'll get the next chapter up just as quickly as I've gotten these last three, but I'm exiting the 'heaps of free time' part of summer and entering the 'oh no, I've got stuff to do before school starts up again!' mode._

_Nightshade – Thank you! Snape is definitely my favorite character in the series, and I'm doing my best to keep him in character. It will be interesting to see how his and Harry's forced relationship progresses, for sure!_

Harry quickly followed Snape down the hall, not wanting to be left with Adrian. He tailed the professor just far enough behind to be out of reach if the man should abruptly stop, but not far enough back that if Adrian caught up he would be a danger. It was an uncomfortable distance, but somehow Harry felt Snape didn't want him in sight, even if he had rescued the first year from Adrian.

They descended a stairway and Harry found himself recognizing the hall as one on the way to the Slytherin common room. They did not, however turn to approach the wall that served as a hidden doorway to the room, but rather continued further down, descending another flight of stairs. They were headed, Harry realized, towards the room where Harry had Potions for the first time just that morning.

Instead, however, Snape cut the trip short, turning off the hallway into a small room. As they stepped inside, the hanging lantern flickered to life, allowing for the dim illumination of a desk and chairs in the center, as well as several bookcases and cupboards lining the walls. Harry realized this must be the professor's office. The man shut the door and silently took his place behind the desk, leaving Harry standing awkwardly between the two chairs.

It was Harry's first trip into a professor's office; he wondered if they were all so small. In the meager lighting, the room felt even smaller. On the left hand wall was a sturdy wooden door; Harry couldn't see any sign of where it led. He peered into the windowed cabinets, but the glass was so dirty and the lighting so poor he couldn't make out the objects inside. The books on the shelves had cracked, worn spines. One of the few with a visible title, a large, black, leather-bound book, had in large, gold lettering, "_A History of Lethal Potions: Magical Poisoning Through the Ages_ by Percival Prince" running down the spine. Harry shivered, not caring to find out what Snape's other reading selections were. They were probably equally horrible, he figured.

The man was fixedly glaring at Harry. He scanned the boy's uncombed hair and glasses. During one of Harry's falls they had bent, so they were now askew, and his tie had come loose. Snape looked over his clothing disapprovingly, at last settling his scrutinizing gaze on the burnt sleeve of Harry's shirt and the red swellings on his hand.

"I have seen many odd behaviors in new students, Potter," he said quite softly, at last breaking the silence. "But never have I seen a student so keen on destroying his own wardrobe."

Harry blinked, unsure of how to respond. It was an odd thing for anyone to say, let alone the professor who had treated him so coldly. Was the man mocking him? With the flatness of his quiet voice, it was hard to tell if Snape's tone was sarcastic or merely bored. Harry opened his mouth to protest—the slobbery of his appearance wasn't on purpose, after all—but Snape spoke before he could say a word.

"Show me your hand."

Harry hesitated, but could think of no reason to protest and stepped forward, reluctantly stretching his arm across the desk. Snape seemed equally unenthused, but gingerly lifted the hand and turned it over so he could see the full extent of the damage. His expression turned to one of disgust, as though he were handling a road kill carcass. His hands were cold and clammy, and Harry had to fight back the urge not to pull his arm away. After a moment, the professor pulled out his wand, pressing the tip into Harry's palm, where the burns were the worst.

Suddenly Harry's hand burned, feeling almost as hot as it did when Adrian had injured it. He yelped and tried to pull back, but Snape only tightened his grip on the boy's wrist. Harry cringed as pain flared up his arm, but then from Snape's wand seemed to seep a new sensation, one of coolness that eased the pain as it spread. As Harry stared with disturbed fascination, the burn seems to retract into Snape's wand.

At last, the professor let go and sat back in his chair, tucking his wand away. Harry's hand was still red, but the swelling and most of the pain was gone. He pulled it back, poking the mark with his other hand. It hurt, but not nearly as badly.

Harry looked up at the Potions Master, conflicted. On one hand, this was the man who'd gone out of his way in class to comment on the boy's faults, who'd openly mocked him in front of his classmates even though he was rumored to favor Slytherins. On the other, he'd just rescued Harry—intentionally or no—from a potentially disastrous run-in with the most feared student in the whole school, and on top of that fixed his hand. No, Harry's eleven-year-old brain could not figure out what to make of the man.

"Thank you, Professor," he said at last, hating to be stuck in an awkward silence.

Snape sighed and waved to the two chairs. "Sit, Potter," he ordered. The boy settled uncomfortably into one of the seats, feeling much too small for the chair. He waited, but the professor took a moment before speaking again. "Explain what happened."

Harry looked down at his hand. He'd wanted to escape the silence, but he'd hoped it would be more in the form of leaving the room. "I ran into Adrian going around the corner. He told me to be careful and offered me a hand up, but then said some spell that made his hand hot, then used some spell to throw me down the hall. I ran, and used _nox_ on lights, but then ran into you, Professor."

Snape stirred for a moment. "You used _nox_ on the lights?" he asked. Harry nodded.

"I only know three spells, sir, and turning him into a needle didn't seem possible."

The professor stared at him for a moment. His mouth twitched, but only to be followed by a frown. "Let me make this clear, Potter," he said slowly. "I would imagine that Miss Hawthorne has already warned you not to travel on your own in the hallways near the dungeon. Mr. LaConner will always be there when you are, as he has a particular gift for finding those who are vulnerable. Seeing as you've already made it clear you will not be following Miss Hawthorne's advice, I would strongly suggest that if you can wrap your mind around it, you should learn a shielding charm." He paused, but then added, "After seeing your performance in Potions today, I would imagine you'd want to start on that _sooner_ rather than later so you might have enough time to understand what the directions mean before you run into Mr. LaConner again."

Harry started, catching the insult. "Professor, I—" he retorted, but the man cut him off.

"And in the future, Potter," he continued, "I will not be rescuing you, or bandaging your scrapes and healing your bruises. If you would _pay attention_ in my class, I am sure you will find yourself able to make burn-cure salves for yourself. Do I make myself clear?"

Harry glared at the man, but nodded. "Yes." Snape raised an eyebrow, and Harry muttered, "Yes, sir."

"On that note, I have heard from the other teachers about your less than exemplary performance in their classes."

"My what?"

"Now, if you were a _Hufflepuff,_ this would not be a problem. As it were you have been, unfortunately, sorted into Slytherin House. In Slytherin, Potter, less than exemplary is not acceptable." Snape stared, unblinking, into the boy's stunned glare, and for a moment seemed to stumble on his words, but caught up the thought again in a heartbeat. "As one of your fame, Potter, you will undoubtedly be looked at as an example of all Slytherin. No matter how the rest of the House performs, your actions will reflects on your peers. As Head of Slytherin, I will not tolerate having a House known for its idiocy." Snape paused, letting his words sink in. "Therefore, Potter," he continued, "If at any time in the year I hear a teacher commenting on your poor performance, you will receive detention with Mr. Filch. Understood?"

"But Professor!" Harry exclaimed. "That's not fair!"

Snape's face twisted into a contorted sneer. "Life isn't fair, Potter. Not that a boy of your fame will ever understand." He waved his hand, and the door creaked open. "Out."

Harry stared at the man, contemplating how to best retort, but instead stood and stormed out of the office, down the hall towards the common room. As he came around the corner, he ran straight into someone—Blaise. The boy blinked at him.

"Hello, Harry," he said. "I thought you went back to the common room ages ago."

Harry shook his head. "You wouldn't believe what just—" He was cut off by the echoing of a door slamming shut behind him. Blaise stepped out and peered down the hall.

"Blimey, someone's in a mood."

"Come on," said Harry, stalking towards the common room. "I don't want to run into Adrian again; I don't think he'd much care that there's two of us."

"You mean Adrian _LaConner_?" said Blaise incredulously. "But you don't look so bad."

"Yeah, I ran into Professor Snape, too—_Salazar_," he ordered a wall crossly, and the bricks shifted aside to reveal a doorway. The boys opened it and headed into the Slytherin common room. The walls were glowing with the pale green light that lit the room; beyond the marble slabs was the lake. They crossed the dark room quickly, not lingering to admire the elegant architecture or black-leather furniture. "He saved me from Adrian, but had to fix my hand up," Harry continued, leading them up one of the four stairways on the wall opposite the main entrance. "Adrian got it pretty bad. And then he started lecturing me about—what the…?"

The boys had entered the first-year dormitory, a long, rectangular room with walls of the same thin marble as the main common room and two skylight windows looking up into the lake. Harry and Blaise had taken the two beds at the far end of the room, leaving the others for Draco Malfoy, Gregory Goyle, Vincent Crabbe, and Theodore Nott, the other first-year boys. At the beginning of the week, their beds had been neatly made and lined with black silk curtains, their trunks at the end of their beds, and their robes neatly hung in the closets and other clothes folded and in the dressers beside their beds. Now, Blaise's was still in that condition, bed kept perfectly in order by housekeeping.

Harry's things, however, had been carefully removed from storage and thrown about the room. His curtains had been ripped from the bed and, from the looks of it, lit on fire. Next to the upturned trunk, a bottle of ink had been smashed.

The boys stared at the mess in shock, but suddenly Blaise laughed. "Who'd you annoy, Harry?" he asked, throwing his book bag onto his bed. "Come on, let's get this cleaned up."

Harry did not budge. "Who would do this?" he asked quietly. He doubted Adrian would have targeted him singularly, and he could not remember getting into fights with anyone else.

"Oh, I imagine some of the upperclassmen just wanted to give you a proper greeting. But look." Blaise pulled out his wand and waved it at a pair of trousers that had somehow ended up on top of the bedposts. "_Wingardium Leviosa!"_ The pants lurched into the air, wobbling, and Blaise conducted them towards the dresser. For some reason he couldn't quite get them into the open drawer, so he settled for leaving them in a heap on the floor beside it.

"How'd you do that?" Harry demanded. "You saw me in class! The only time my feather moved was when I poked it."

"You're probably just saying it wrong or something," said Blaise uncertainly. "I could barely hear you over everyone else. Let's see it, then."

Harry took out his wand and pointed it at a pair of socks. "_Wingardium Leviosa!"_ The socks wobbled pathetically.

"Of course! You've got to line up the wand movements with the words, Harry!" Blaise urged. He looked excited to have figured it out. "Flick it on the 'o,' not the 'levi' part."

Harry shrugged and tried again. "_Wingardium Levi—_oops. _Wingardium Leviosa!"_

The socks rose into the air, jerking violently, but Harry was ecstatic. "I'm doing it!" he shouted. "Blaise, it's working!"

"Well, it's not _that_ hard," his friend replied, levitating a shirt on top of the pants. Harry finally got bored of making the socks fly back and forth across the room and settled them down on Blaise's pile.

"It's just," he said, turning to Blaise, "I was beginning to think this was all a big mistake, you know. Being here at Hogwarts. I haven't been able to do anything right all week—even Potions!"

"It's not like they'd invite you to Hogwarts if you weren't a wizard, Harry," Blaise reassured. "They never invite squibs, no matter how famous you are. My brother said there's always a ton of Hufflepuffs who can't work a single spell for months, but even they get it eventually."

Harry frowned, apparently not comforted by the words, but was distracted by his spare cloak, which was wrapped around the lantern between his and Blaise's beds. "_Wingardium Leviosa!"_

They continued piling the clothes until they ran out, then turned over the trunk and levitated Harry's books back inside. Harry was struggling with getting _A History of Magic_ to fit inside when a shrill voice rang out, "What is this mess, Potter?"

The boys spun around, half expecting Professor McGonagall to sweep in and lecture them about vandalizing school property, but it was not a professor. Blaise laughed. "It's just you, Rose," he said as she stalked towards him. "I thought you were—well."

"I was who?" Rose demanded. She suddenly glared at Harry, suggesting, "Professor Snape?"

Harry shook his head furiously. "When we got back, my things were all over the place," he explained, quickly changing the subject. Rose raised an eyebrow, making such a Snape-like expression Harry nearly laughed.

"They still are all over the place," she commented, pulling out her wand. She pointed it at the mess, and with a flourish, ordered, "_Pack!" _The clothes rose up into the air, folded themselves, and slid neatly into the drawers. The books straightened themselves out, arranging themselves by size. Potions ingredients slid back into their cases, and his quills replaced themselves in the boxes Harry had bought them in. Rose frowned at the shattered ink jar. "_Reparo!" _she commanded, and it reformed completely. "_Tergeo!"_

Harry watched in fascination as the ink slid up and into the bottle, and with another flick of her wrist, Rose made it fly to settle on the stack of quills in his trunk. Rose stepped over to the bed, ignoring the awed expressions of the first years faces, inspected the torn curtains. At last, she poked them with her wand. _"Scourgify. Reparo."_

The curtains returned to their original position, for all intensive purposes as good as new. Allowing for a satisfied smile, she replaced her wand in her cloak and turned back to the boys. "That's better, then."

Harry noticed he was gawking and quickly shut his mouth, but Blaise, as usual, had a word or two to spare. "_Bravo!_" he said excitedly. "You are truly the queen of—"

"Oh, shut your trap, Zabini," she snapped in the most un-ladylike manner. Harry was startled by her change in tone, but he could swear he saw a blush in her cheeks. "Now, Potter," she continued. "Explain."

Harry shrugged. "Really, Rose, I don't know what happened," he insisted. "We haven't been back since just after Potions."

"Well, unless the house elves misunderstood their orders for your case alone, you must have annoyed someone."

Harry shook his head. "I mean—I did run into Adrian, and Snape just got through with lecturing me—but neither of them would—"

"Really, Rose," said Blaise, cutting him off. "It was probably just a warm welcome from some of our upperclassmen. You know, 'welcome to the house; now deal with this.'" Rose gave him a look, but said nothing. Harry spoke again, distracted by what he himself had just said.

"Rose," he said quietly, "Professor Snape just got done with lecturing me about how whatever I do is going to reflect on the whole house. This couldn't have anything to do with that, would it?"

"What do you mean?" the prefect asked, confused.

Harry shrugged helplessly. "He just said that everyone else in Slytherin is going to have to deal with any mistakes I make, because… well because I'm me, I guess."

Rose studied the boy carefully and pursed her lips. "I think that's just Professor Snape's way of saying he wants you to do well, Potter."

Harry shook his head. "He said if he heard anything about me doing poorly he'd give me detention!" he insisted.

"Professor Snape is a very complicated man."

Blaise cut in. "Never mind that, he's also a genius of a wizard, I've heard. You must have picked some of that up from him, Rose—my brother always said you spend too much time around him and Adrian."

"Your brother doesn't know what he's talking about," Rose said, but rather than snap at Blaise she just sighed. "Him and my brother both."

Harry studied her carefully. "If you're not related to Professor Snape, Rose, are you related to Adrian?"

Rose sighed. "That again, Potter? Listen: I don't have any cousins at Hogwarts, and my family line's pretty small, anyways. Professor Snape was a friend of my parents, back in the day, but that is it. As for Adrian… well, I don't even know; he never met his father, but as far as I know I'm no more related to him than I am to any other wizard you pluck off the streets."

Harry frowned. "But you are related to them?"

Rose laughed. "My parents were purebloods, just like Zabini's, and your father and Professor Snape's mother."

"So?"

"So the wizarding world isn't that big, Harry," said Blaise. "Most of us are related—loosely, of course. Think about it. There's only about forty of us in our year, right? This is all of the wizards in Britain. We're one of the bigger schools in Europe, too."

"I still don't get it," said Harry. "You mean us three and… and Professor Snape are all related? And—and Draco and Crabbe and Goyle, too? They're purebloods, right?"

Rose sighed. "Distantly, you're related to half the school, Harry," she said. "And that's only considering traceable relations."

"I don't see why it's still bothering you, Harry," said Blaise. "If you think about it, there's really not that many options. Most wizards hardly ever meet muggles, and so there's not really that many half bloods. Muggle-borns are even rarer. Even when they're born, they might not be found, or their parents might not let them come."

"The wizarding world doesn't expand altogether quickly," rose agreed. "And the pureblood lines are even tighter, because so many refuse to marry beyond them."

"But why not?" asked Harry. "My parents married."

"Well, your father's family was always quite small," said Rose. "In any case, I'd hardly consider Adrian my relative, any more than I would you. And Professor Snape is nothing more than a friend of the family."

Harry was startled. "Professor Snape has friends?"

Rose shook her head and crossed her arms. "For being so famous, Potter, you really are quite small-minded." She shot a glance at Blaise and started to leave, but halted, turning back to Harry. "It was Professor Snape who fixed your hand, wasn't it?" she asked.

"Yes?"

"Like I said, Professor Snape is a complicated man." She turned and swept out of the room, ascending the stairs towards the first-year girls' dorms.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Harry asked, turning back to Blaise, but his friend was not listening.

"Did Professor Snape really say he'd give you detention?"

Harry glumly sat on his trunk, which had snapped smartly shut after Rose's charms. "Yeah," he said. "He said the other teachers said I'd given a 'less than exemplary performance' in their classed, whatever that means, and he said if he heard that again he'd—well."

Blaise shook his head. "That's a load of bollocks," he replied. "You saw that Gryffindor Finnegan in Charms—his feather exploded! And Longbottom didn't get so much as a shine to his toothpick."

"But I just barely made mine look silver! Yours already had an eye and all."

"Well, there's an obvious solution to all of this."

Harry looked up, amazed. "There is?"

"Of course!" Blaise laughed. "We just have to get better at all our classes than everyone else."

"You don't mean…"

"Yes I do. Studying. Come on, Harry," said Blaise. "We've got all weekend to get our needles right, and maybe if we read ahead a bit in our charms book we can figure out why out levitations aren't steady."

Harry moaned, but relented. "I supposed you're right," he grumbled, "But we've got all our homework to do first. We've got Defense Against the Dark Arts _and_ Potions. And—wait, what time is it?"

Blaise checked his watch. "Three twenty." He paused, and looked up to Harry. "Three twenty!"

"We've got flying in ten minutes!" Harry shouted, and the pair ran out of the room.


	6. In Which Harry Flies

_After days spent trying to finish this chapter with a POV following Harry, I realized how utterly pointless that was. So, sorry this bit is shorter than usual; next chapter is Snape POV and will theoretically be longer._

_I do have one explanation as to why something so short took so long—if you notice in the chapter the name "Kellah" mentioned, you might be confused—so was I! Anyone who's done research into the female members of Gryffindor house in Harry's year will feel my pain. A short summary is that there are (in the normal series) ten Gryffindors (twenty brooms at the lesson, exactly ten Slytherins), however, the 'five' Gryffindor girls are actually six people. After much debate with friends, I decided to use the name of the one with pretty much only a name, and, if it ever becomes necessary, the descriptors given of the one who is never named._

_One other thing that is holding me up is some minor errors I've been making in terms of the main story line, but I leave those half to the butterfly effect off Harry's change in house and half to creative licensing. I'll be smoothing them out as I go._

_To Nightshade's sydneylover150, you're asking the right questions! But I'm not going to answer them just yet, because Harry and Snape both have a bit of struggling to do before we get there. Hope you enjoy!_

_To Jordina, I'm glad you're enjoying the story! Thanks for the comments :D But you'll have to keep reading to answer your questions, it will all become apparent eventually… or at least, it should._

_To csibip, thank you! I hope you continue to enjoy it!_

_And with that, we're off!_

As Harry and Blaise rounded the corner to race towards where most of the Slytherin and Gryffindor first-years had already gathered, they nearly ran into Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle. Harry jumped back, not wanting to have a forth collision in one day, making Draco laugh.

"A bit jumpy there, Potter?" he asked. "Just don't jump off your broom. You haven't flown before, have you? Com e on, walk with us to class."

Harry was hesitant. He had managed to avoid Draco most of the week, but even from across classrooms he'd gotten a pretty good picture of the boy's personality. He'd been telling anyone who'd listen stories of how his father and he had gone to the last Quidditch World Cup together, even though it had been in Brazil. For the last two days, since they'd found out they'd be starting flying early with the Gryffindors, he'd been insulting them in the halls. "Hey Schlongbottom," he'd call, "Hope your broom can hold you up in the air long enough for me to knock you back up—assuming you can even get it to fly!" Draco was proud and full of himself, and from what Harry had seen of him before coming to Hogwarts, not an exactly pleasant fellow. Still, they would be sharing dorms for the next seven years, so it wouldn't hurt to be on good terms.

Just as they reached the two rows of brooms laid out in the grass, their instructor arrived. She glared at them with her yellow, hawk-like eyes.

"Well?" barked Madame Hooch. "What are you waiting for? Everyone stand by a broomstick. Hurry it up."

Harry and Blaise broke off from Draco's group and stood at the two brooms between Theodore Nott and Ron Weasley, who'd been so desperate to avoid getting stuck next to Hermione Granger he'd chosen the broom in the middle of the Slytherin boys. Harry was tempted to strike a conversation with his redheaded neighbor, but Madame Hooch was glaring them down again.

"Stick your right hand out over the broom—your right hand, Longbottom—and say 'Up!'"

"UP!" everyone shouted.

Harry's broom slammed into his hand, startling him. He looked around; only a few others had managed. Blaise's kept rising hallway when he said "Up," but it'd fall back down before it reached his hand. Harry turned just in time to see Ron's broom swing up and hit him in the forehead.

"Are you alright?" asked Harry, offering the boy a hand up. Ron stared at him hesitantly for a moment before taking it.

"Fine, thanks," he said. He nodded towards Harry's broom. "How'd you do that?"

Harry shrugged. "I think the brooms can tell if you really want them 'up,'" he said, noticing how Neville's merely rolled over at the nervous quaver in his voice.

Ron turned back to his broom and held out a hand. "Up!" At first it just rolled over, but a moment later it jumped up into his hand. Ron grinned and turned back to Harry.

"Sweet!" he said. "Glad to know you're not one of _them_."

Harry frowned. "One of who?" he asked.

"Oh, you know," said Ron. He jerked his head sharply towards the other row. "Malfoy's lot."

"And what makes you think—" began Harry, but Madame Hooch was calling for their attention.

"Just pick it up, Longbottom," she sighed. "Now, here's how to mount your broom—pay attention, we don't want you sliding off the end mid-flight." She demonstrated, and walked down the rows to check their grips. "No, Malfoy," she sighed. "First, right hand in front—right, see? Bring your left hand up a bit—that's it." She continued down and around until she was satisfied, and took her place at the front again.

"Now," called Madame Hooch. "When I blow my whistle, you'll kick off hard, and hover a few feet up, then come right back down by leaning forward slightly. Keep your brooms nice and steady. On my whistle—three—two—one—"

The class kicked off all at once. Some, like Longbottom, just fell right back down, as though their brooms weren't magical at all. Ron Weasley was bobbing up and down, a panicked expression on his face, and Crabbe's broom was so low to the ground his knees were in the grass.

Not Harry, though. He rose his broom ten feet into the air, exhilarated, before Madame Hooch called, "That's high enough, Potter!" and ordered him back down. Harry was sad to feel solid ground again; he wanted to be up in the air again. He turned to discuss this with Blaise, but found the boy hovering, perfectly still, his face and knuckles pure white as he held the broomstick in a death grip.

"Don't talk to me!" he hissed, his gaze fixed straight ahead. "I'm going to fall off this twig and break something."

"But you're only a few feet off the ground," Harry urged.

Past Theo, another Slytherin, Daniel Harper, had been ordered back on the ground by Madame Hooch. She seemed to be having a similar conversation with Tracy Davis, whose broom had for some reason taken to spinning in a leftwards circle.

"Now," said Madame Hooch when she'd finally talked Blaise and the others back to the ground. "On my whistle, you are to kick off from the ground, rise ten feet in the air, and hover there. You are oto rise only ten feet—" she looked pointedly at Harry, "And to stay there, waiting for everyone. Three—two—one—"

Most of the class made it into the air this time, but only Harry, Daniel, and a Gryffindor Boy who's name Harry hadn't yet caught managed to hover in the air. Harry looked down to Blaise, once again frozen in death grip.

"Well, come on then, Blaise," he called.

"I'm going to fall off my broom!"

"Then your brother will fix you up, right? Come on, pull up."

After a minute, Blaise complied, slowly rising up to settle beside Harry. He fixed his friend with a glare reading very clearly of his desire to be back with his feet planted firmly on the ground. Harry laughed.

"But look, mate," he insisted. "You're twice as steady as anyone else here! I think you might be a natural."

Blaise was about to retort icily when suddenly a figure came shooting through the air at Harry. He quickly rolled on his broom to avoid being hit then spun around to see Draco, most pale-faced than ever, speeding forward in huge loops. Madame Hooch flew after him s, shouting.

Harry laughed with the others, but Ron, whose broom was once again keen on bobbing up and down, was staring at him, not Malfoy. "How'd you do that?" he demanded as he passed him on the way up.

"What?"

"Roll over like that."

"I dunno," shrugged Harry. "Just did it, I suppose."

By this time, Madame Hooch had chased Draco back into his spot. "Steady yourself, Weasley!" she snapped. "Now, one by one—in order—we're going to go down the line. You're to raise up ten more feet, pull right, and fly a quick loop around the class before going back to your place. Who's first? No—not you, Longbottom. Granger!"

The whole class watched with slight satisfaction—or, in Ron's case, _incredible_ satisfaction—as the girl who was so enthusiastic in the other classes paled and shook on her broom. None the less, she rose shakily higher up into the air, and did a painfully slow loop around the class before returning to her place.

"Good, good," said Madame Hooch, though she looked anything but pleased by Hermione's pace. "Hurry it up."

Another Gryffindor girl was up next. She pulled up alright—an much faster than Hermione—but as soon as she went to turn her broom went flying backwards. The girl who had been next to her in line—Fay Dunbar—shrieked, and Madame Hooch quickly sped after the girl, brandishing her wand. The girl was halfway across the field before she slowed, and after a very urgent conversation with Madame Hooch, the pair flew back to the group at a more reasonable pace.

"Kellah," Ron whispered to Harry between fits of laughter. "She's been worrying about this all week!"

Once Madame Hooch had gotten the class settled down, Fay and Seamus took their turns. Both flew quite well, though not as well as Daniel, who went next. "Very good," said Madame Hooch. "You've flown before?"

The girl adjusted her glasses, blushing visibly. "Just a bit," she said in a timid voice.

Tracy, who Daniel had been helping earlier, went just as slow as Hermione had. For some reason her broom was weaving back and forth as she went, so Madame Hooch made her circle about them for five minutes until she started complaining about school brooms. Theodore Nott, the next boy, rose silently up into the air, looped about the class, and settled back down with such a bored expression on his face Harry wondered what else his mind could possibly be on. After all, they were _flying_—there was hardly anything more exciting than that.

Then it was Blaise's turn. He didn't move. His eyes were still fixed straight ahead, and his hands gripping the handle so tightly it was a wonder it didn't snap. Harry glanced around—he could see Dean lean over and whisper something to Neville, and a smirk that Harry didn't like one bit was growing on Draco's face. Harry leaned slightly towards his friend—"Go on then, Blaise!"

It seemed to break Blaise's trance, for he shot Harry an irritated look. "Shut up," he muttered, pulling his broom up into the air.

It happened very quickly. One moment Blaise was on his broom, turning it in a pedantically slow manner to begin his loop, and the next he was falling right past Harry, speeding towards the ground. Harry didn't even notice what he was doing as he dropped his broom down and grabbed the back of Blaise's collar, dangling the boy only a few feet off the ground.

A collective gasp came from the class a moment later as what had just happened struck them. Harry, who could barely hold the taller boy's weight, lowered Blaise down and let go, and the two looked back up in the air—only to break apart instantly as the broom came flying towards them.

The class was shrieking, and Harry looked behind him—was that broom _chasing _him? It was—he urged his own broom faster, weaving and dodging as his peers scattered every which way.

"LAND NOW!" Madame Hooch was shouting, but Harry really couldn't see how that would help him. He was much faster on his broom than on the ground, and didn't even stop to think what might happen if the broom caught up with him. Harry was flying as fast as he could, but he couldn't seem to shake the broomstick. He sped towards the castle, hoping to lose the tail by weaving through the architecture in the courtyard, and narrowly avoided hitting Professor Snape, who was on his way towards the lawn.

Harry circled around to the other side of the astronomy tower, where he sat, waiting. For a moment, he thought he was safe; the broom hadn't followed him. But not a second later, he heard the sound of shattering glass and shrieking, and the broomstick emerged from the window beneath him.

Harry sped back around the tower, going into a near free-fall dive to the courtyard below. He pulled up at the last second, flying over the barrier back towards the class. Checking over his shoulder, the broom was getting closer, closer—it was nearly on him—

"CONFRINGO!"

It was lucky for Harry that he had been flying close to the lawn at this point, for the blast that blew the tailing broom to splinters also chucked the boy off his broom, sending him tumbling through the grass. He must have rolled seven times before settling down, eagle-spread, on his back. He groaned as the class rushed towards him.

The whole group was shouting at him, but louder than the rest was Madame Hooch. "Back off, you lot! Potter, are you alright?"

Harry blinked his eyes open and tried to sit up—"My glasses…"

"Here they are!"

"Well, give them here, then!" the flying teacher snapped. A moment later the world came into focus as she thrust them onto the boys head—and the first thing he saw was the last thing he wanted to: Professor Snape scowling down at him as he tucked his wand into his robes.

"I'm fine," Harry insisted. In fact, he was. He felt brilliant, like he could run from Hogwarts to London and back. He tried to push Madame Hooch away. "I'm fine, really—ow!"

She had found the injury she had been searching for in his wrist. Grabbing it roughly—a bit more roughly than she ought to have, all things considered—she prodded at it, making Harry yelp. "Broken wrist!" she said. Harry could swear he heard a bit of triumph in her voice. "Don't worry, Madame Pomphrey will have you fixed up in no time—can you take him, Severus?"

For a moment Snape looked like he was going to protest, but then he reached down and grabbed Harry by his injured arm, dragging him to his feet. "In the mean time, _Rolanda_," he spat, none-too-pleased with his job, "Perhaps it would be best if you called Professor Flitwick out to examine your broomsticks, hm?" He fixed her with his iciest glare before turning and sweeping off, pulling the first year with him.


	7. In Which the Investigation Begins

_Sorry for the wait! Unfortunately, school is about to begin again, so my updates may become just as spread out as these past few have been. I have already begun work on the next few chapters, however, and am interested to see how you react to the next narrator._

_To werecatninja: Thank you! I hope you continue to enjoy!_

_To Nightshade sidneylover150: I'm glad you're enjoying the story! Hopefully I can keep provoking your questions—and answer many of them soon!_

_With that, enjoy!_

Snape generally liked the greenhouses, which was odd, because he'd never had much interest in herbology. The main reason he'd bothered paying attention back when he was in school, and perhaps the only reason he'd continued to follow the subject after graduating, was to continue in his mastery of potions. Overall he was not at all intrigued by the study of plants, and found that allergies were more than reason enough to avoid them. Yet still the professor would find himself wandering across the campus when he had too much time or something nagging on his mind to the greenhouses, where it was just the plants and he.

Herbology had always been to Snape a field of study like History of Magic. Plants were generally set in their ways already. While occasionally some new discovery would be made―who knew that mandrake leaves could be brewed into a tea that aided in recovering memories before Professor Sprout?―it was not like potions, where experimentation with ingredients led to the creation of cures for diseases that would long plague muggles, or spell casting, where with a knowledge of language and magical theory one could create their own spells, for better or worse. And plants, unlike spells and potions, were singular. For every curse there was a counter curse; every poison an antidote. But there was no anti-spinach or counter-mistletoe.

Plants were ingredients, to be used for potions and healing and dining. With the exception of cross-breeders, who had a great deal more patience and free time than Snape did, they were not an experiment.

Professor Snape had little patience for things he already knew about. He detested teaching beginning potions for that very reason―simple things like the boils-cure potion were a simple matter of gathering the proper ingredients and following directions. Even in his first year, Snape had found the standard curriculum exceptionally boring, and while the then-potions master Horace Slughorn wasn't looking he had begun modifying recipes. Sometimes he just improved the existing ones, perfecting the recipe beyond what Slughorn had thought possible. Sometimes he switched ingredients, trying to figure out how to reverse the effects. More often than not, he ignored the directions entirely, ignoring Slughorn's shock when his anti-itching salve came out instead as a cream that disguised scars.

On this particular occasion, Snape was looking for flitterbloom plants to trim leaves from for his calming draught. He also needed young hellebore blossoms, but Professor Sprout wouldn't be having those planted until October, so he had owled one of the apocatharies in Diagon Alley to order them. Snape much preferred to gather ingredients for himself, to know the environment they had been taken from so he could modify his potions accordingly, but he had a feeling that the year would require multiple brewings of calming draught, if it continued as it had begun.

At last finding the plant he was searching for, Snape pulled clippers from his robes. The tentacle-like vines pulled away from his touch, but Snape was faster: he grabbed one and promptly cut it just low enough that he had gotten five or six leaves on his clipping. Replacing the clippers within his cloak, he drew out a vial and caught the milky pus dripping from the wounded stem, and finally wrapped the tendril up in a thin brown paper. The whole process was a science―Snape was not one to waste ingredients and so gathered them with the utmost care. He replaced the vial and cutting into one of the inner pockets of his cloak and turned to return to the dungeons.

As he exited the greenhouse pathway, a figure nearly crashed into him, jumping away at the last moment. Snape glared, mouth half opened to take away points from whatever student wasn't paying attention to where he was walking, but found that the man before him was the skittering Professor Quirrel, who had gone white as a sheet and was backing away slowly.

"S—s—Severus," he stammered. "Didn't—s—see you th—there…"

Snape snorted in disgust. This… _idiot_ was the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher? The old jealousy rose in his throat, but Snape pushed it aside. His eyes drifted, as always, to the hideous purple turban wrapped around the shaking man's shaking head. It was a ridiculous thing that smelled of garlic and—and _something_—and made the sliver of a man resemble a toxic mushroom. And yet…

His left hand reflexively clenched as the old itch rose up in his forearm. _That_ was never a good sign. And Lily's son, at the feast in the great hall. He had touched his scar as he had gazed up at the head table. It wasn't some sort of nervous habit—he would have noticed it if the boy had repeated the action in his presence. And Albus had told him to keep an eye on the man…

"I—I'll just be—be g—going, th—then," Quirrel stuttered, backing away.

Snape raised an eyebrow and spun around. He stalked down the hallway. This was getting ridiculous—Snape was stingy with his trust, and he knew it, but this was downright paranoia. It was Potter's fault, stirring up memories of his school days, when he always had his wand at the ready…

_Blood._

The smell like rust in Quirrel's turban. The stench he was trying to drown out with garlic cloves. Snape cursed; he should have recognized it from the start—he'd been all-too-familiar with the scent. Finding himself stopped in his tracks, Snape spun around, intending to chase the Professor down and demand an answer. Instead, he caught sight of the man turning sharply up the stairs between himself and the path to the greenhouses. Snape paused again, his eyes drifting out the windows lining the hallway, to where the stairs led.

Where Snape stood was part of the four open-air hallways surrounding a stone courtyard. His side connected to the astronomy tower, and led further to border another, longer space—a green—and beyond that to the central building of Hogwarts. The two paths perpendicular to his also bordered the courtyard. One, which he stood just past, led out towards the hillside where the first years were in their first flying lesson. On the other side of the courtyard, the path was much wider, with benches on either side, and the stairs Quirrel had just climbed led to a second floor that was all but empty. A dueling club had used the space for practice in better weather, though all but two of the members had graduated the year before and as far as Snape knew there was no designated purpose for it this year. Why Quirrel would go up there…

But Snape caught sight of the man through the windows, rushing across the room to look out over the field beyond. Snape squinted, trying to see what the man was doing—was he talking to himself?

It struck him, and Snape was whirling about once again. Snape never ran—it was undignified and an awkward movement in his billowing black robes—but here he was close to it. He sped down the hall closer to him, out towards the field.

A black shape came zooming towards him as Snape neared the archway leading to the field, making Snape leap back and press himself into the wall. It was followed shortly by another blur—a broom?—and Snape's blood ran cold. He sped back into the courtyard, craning his head to see Potter speeding nearly vertically up the face of the Astronomy tower before curving around it out of sight, the rider-less broom hot on his tail. Snape glared down to the window where Quirrel had been, but the man had vanished. Before Snape could find him, Potter came speeding back around the tower—down into the courtyard, getting so close to the ground Snape thought he was going to crash. But the boy lifted up at the last moment, rising up over the courtyard wall, and Snape remembered himself as the rogue broom chased after the boy. Drawing his wand, he stormed out of the stone hallway. Pointing angrily with little regard for the fact that a slight error in aim would blow the boy—not to mention any of the nineteen other children on the lawn—into unrecoverable pieces, Snape barked out in a bellowing voice—"_CONFRINGO!"_

As the boy flew forward onto the lawn, Snape spun about; racing back down to the main hall, but there was no sign of Quirrel. He sighed and tucked his wand away. There was little he could do but return out to the field, pushing aside the crowd of first years to get to Rolanda Hooch, who was crouching at the boy's feet.

The boy groaned and opened his eyes as Snape reached him. At the sight of those eyes, he had to stop himself from swooping down and grabbing the boy up in his arms.

"My glasses—" he was saying.

"Here they are!"

"Well give them here, then!" Hooch snapped, grabbing them away from Hermione Granger, who jumped back in fright, landing on Longbottom's foot. The silver-haired woman slammed the glasses back onto the boy's face, breaking the spell. Snape scowled. The brat was a Potter through and through.

"I'm fine," the boy whined, though as he struggled to sit up it was obvious that he wasn't. "I'm fine, really."

Hooch grabbed his arm roughly, and Snape found himself feeling a fresh wave of anger at Quirrel as he saw the harsh angle. "Broken wrist!" she exclaimed, as though it weren't obvious. "Don't worry; Madame Pomfrey will have you fixed up in no time—can you take him, Severus?"

Snape wanted nothing less than to rush off into the castle and hunt down Quirrel. With the school under tighter security than ever, what with the boy and Dumbledore's safe-guarded charge, the man's actions were nothing short of suspicious, and a simple _priori incantum_ would prove the man's guilt. Anyone who attacked Lily's son—

No! Potter. Stupid Potter. Stupid _weak_ Potter, who probably wouldn't be able to make it to the Hospital Wing without getting himself killed. Snape curled his lip further and snatched the brat's injury away from Hooch, pulling him to his feet. "In the mean time, _Rolanda_," he spat softly. "Perhaps it would be best if you called Professor Flitwick out to examine your broomsticks?" With a final glare he dragged Potter out of the swarm of children and into the castle, keeping his eyes peeled for any sign of the nervous Quirrel.

They did not encounter the stuttering man, however, and reached the hospital ward without disturbance. The castle was oddly quite as Snape stormed into the room, dragging Potter in his wake. He released the boy, waving vaguely at one of the beds. "Sit," he ordered, and stormed into Madame Pomfrey's office.

The woman was sitting at her desk, casually reading a copy of the _Daily Prophet._ "Severus," she greeted as he entered. "Finished that new batch of calming draught yet?"

"No, it was… disturbed." He jerked his head back out the door. "Patient for you."

Alarmed, Madame Pomfrey stood. Usually when Snape brought students to the Hospital Wing himself it was after a run-in with LaConner on a bad day—or worse—so when she found Potter still standing where Snape had left him she looked quite relieved. "What seems to be the problem, dear?" she asked. Potter silently gripped his injured arm tighter, glancing quickly at Snape before staring pointedly at the floor.

Snape sneered, but was feeling equally displeased by the boy's presence. He glanced at the clock in one of the ghastly paintings beside the doorway—it was only four, and the headmaster wasn't leaving for the ministry until five. "I'll be back to deal with you in an hour," he told Potter, and added to Madame Pomfrey, "Make sure he doesn't leave." With that he swept out of the room.

Things were starting to make less and less sense at Hogwarts, and Snape didn't like it. As Head of Slytherin, he usually spent the beginning of the year dealing with problem students and assigning essays and detentions to those who would not listen. His standard encounters with dark arts were little more than LaConner's ever-growing repertoire of curses and the occasional item brought in from Borgin and Burke's. But a full on attack on a first-year? Snape didn't doubt that the broom would have kept chasing Potter until he caught up, and if it had…

But why Quirrel?

Snape had never liked the man. Quirrel had originally taught Muggle Studies, a subject Snape was less-than-interested in, but in that role he had kept to himself. He had seemed a smart enough, if drab teacher that did not particularly stand out for anything. When Dumbledore had announced that Quirrel would be taking over the spot of Defense Against the Dark Arts, however, Snape had been flabbergast. Although he had heard of the man's skills in the field, particularly in wordless and wandless magic, which Snape himself valued as largely important parts of the subject, he was disgusted that a man with such weak character would be teaching such an important subject. As far as he could see, Quirrel had little more than a dilettante knowledge of the Dark Arts, only backed by the sabbatical summer the man had taken to 'prepare' him for the job. What could a single summer's experience do to aid in teaching students to battle future conflict that was sure to come? As the Dark Arts were Snape's personal passion, he was insulted, at the least, by Dumbledore's choice in staffing.

As he approached the stone gargoyle at the base of the stairs leading to the Headmaster's office, Snape forced himself to calm down. He was not here to argue with the man about his desire for the Defense position; he was here to speak professionally about a threat to the school and to Lily's—no, to the famous Harry Potter, pride of Hogwarts. He was here to discuss the possibility of the need to take steps to keep a Slytherin student from harm, and to prompt investigation into the ridiculous Professor Quirrel.

No! Not ridiculous! Unusual. Unlikely. Uninteresting.

"Chocolate Frogs," he said impassively to the gargoyle, and ascended the stairs as they unfolded their way to the Headmaster's door.

"Ah, Severus," said Dumbledore. He stood behind his desk, exactly as Snape had left him just hours earlier. "Back so soon?"

Snape raised an eyebrow, but waved past Dumbledore to the balcony window deeper in the office. "Did you see?"

The man sighed. He tapped his wand on the stack of papers on his desk, which promptly stood on end and shuffled off the desk and into an open drawer, which slammed shut. "Professor Quirrel's papers," Dumbledore said, a resigned tone in his voice. "I had meant to discuss him with you earlier, but you departed rather abruptly."

"You've noticed it to, then?" insisted Severus.

"'It,' Severus? I have certainly noticed a particular oddness about the man since he has returned from his travels, but what precisely you define as 'it' escapes me."

Snape's face stiffened. He did not like being played by the man, but he kept up his dispassionately bored tone with expert ease. "I imagine you had eyes on the Potter boy during the opening feast, headmaster," he said coolly. "In which case you would have noticed a particular quirk—his scar seemed to pain him much in the same way…"

He paused. The connection somehow disgusted him, and only fed proof to Dumbledore's earlier theorizing. The man stood with a patient expression on his face, waiting for him to finish, so he did, quietly; "…as the dark mark may occasionally bother my arm."

Dumbledore nodded. He had a way of receiving all information as though he had already thought of it, a mannerism that irritated Snape to no end. "There has been no change, though?" he asked, but he was only asking to involve the Potion's Master in his thought process.

"Of course not. Nothing more than the occasional itch—particularly around Quirrel."

Dumbledore raised an eyebrow. "Then perhaps it is just a subconscious alert to the presence of one who would seek to abuse the Dark Arts as Lord Voldemort would?"

Snape stared in blank impatience. "Surely you would not compare such a man to the Dark Lord?"

"In terms of power, no—though you do greatly underestimate my choice in a Defense teacher, Severus. He is not so incompetent as you assume, although much too jumpy to properly teach, I regret. No, I refer to the way he would attack a mere eleven-year-old boy with an unforgiving hex. Lord Voldemort would not so much as consider the murder of a child, save perhaps to bask in what sick pleasure he draws from it." For a moment the headmaster was silent, his brow furrowed in some unmentioned thought, and then he turned away, summoning a bag from his chambers beyond. "No, Severus, Quirrel may not compare to the sheer cruelty of Lord Voldemort, but he has something that is more worrisome—an uncontrolled fear. There is no telling what depths a man will descend to when he is afraid."

"You plan to confront him, then?"

"Not I," said Dumbledore with a slight smile. "Though I imagine you will."

Severus shook his head. "To what end?" he asked slowly—carefully.

"Then what end would you seek?"

"He can do little damage," Snape said dismissively. They both knew it wasn't true, but he knew Dumbledore did not protest. "Personally, I would think it best to let him scramble about. Whatever his intentions, there must be a history to them, and a frightened man, as you say, will make mistakes."

"And the boy?"

"What about him?" asked Snape incredulously. "He has escaped major injury twice today alone, I doubt anything worse than a few broken limbs will affect him."

"Very well," said Dumbledore. Snape was quietly surprised by his allowance—of anyone, he would have expected _Albus Dumbledore_ to protect _Potter_ from any sort of harm, but the man was picking up his bag casually. Explanation came quickly. "I will leave Quirrel to you, Severus, but I also leave Harry. I trust that no 'major injury,' as you put it, will befall him while you satisfy your curiosity with this investigation. But should anything happen to him, I will direct the questioners from the Daily Prophet to your office." He drew up his arm, shaking away his cloak sleeves to reveal a wizard's watch. "And I am late, although the Minister can hardly complain. I will see you at lunch tomorrow."

The old wizard stepped into his fireplace and vanished abruptly, leaving Snape alone in the office. "You walked into that one," a sarcastic voice called from on the wall high above. Snape looked up into the sneering face of Phineas Nigellus Black, one of the many headmasters whose portraits lined the walls. With a cold glance, Snape left the office and hurried to the hospital wing to deal with Potter.

The boy was sitting on the end of a bed, and jumped about a foot in the air when Snape stormed in. Madame Pomfrey quickly hurried out to intercept the Professor. "Fixed up nicely," she said proudly. "His arm will be a bit weak for a few days, but—"

"Thank you, Poppy," Severus said coolly. Potter's recovery was not his concern. The nurse huffed, but got the message, stalking back to her office.

"Sir?" Potter asked after a minute. Snape realized he had been glaring at him thoughtlessly.

"You are once again lucky for my passing by, _Potter_," he said without hesitation. "However, I do not intend to be your personal watchdog. For your own safety, therefore, you will no longer attend flying lessons with your class."

Snape had to admit he got some satisfaction as he saw the boy's face fall. James Potter had always taken the ultimate satisfaction in his flying and Quidditch skills, and he could see that the boy was already developing the same attitude. "But Professor!" Potter exclaimed, leaping to his feet. "That's not fair!" The Potions Master raised a humorless eyebrow.

"Instead, you will use the time to study," he said coolly. This he hadn't planned, but the boy was annoying him. "If you don't study, then it will be detention. Do I make myself clear?"

Potter sank back onto the bed end. "Yes, sir," he mumbled. Satisfied, Snape turned to leave. That was one less time the boy was vulnerable, and once less hour of his time he had to waste watching the boy.

"Sir?" Potter called as Snape neared the doorway. The man was tempted to leave, but paused, allowing the question to be finished. "Why can't I fly?"

What was he supposed to tell the boy? _You're being targeted by curses, your life is in danger, and your Defense Professor is using the Dark Arts against you._ Right.

"Although some were left heaps of gold to spend as they will," Snape said at last, referring to the gold of the Potter family that the boy had inherited with his parents' death, "The school does not wish to pay for every broom that must be blown up to keep you from getting yourself killed." He left quickly, looking forward to an evening uninterrupted by Dumbledore's demand for his attendance at dinner.


	8. In Which Books Break and Beakers Race

_Sorry for the long wait! School and college applications and a wonderfully disastrous NaNoWriMo has held me back from writing for a while now, but while I'm on break I should be able to get quite a bit of writing done! Thanks, as always for the reviews (I will not bore you with my replies this time, as I'm not altogether sure which I have and have not replied to already!) and as always, enjoy!_

Harry wandered glumly to the great hall. His arm itched—Madame Pomfrey had used some spell on it that made it go numb, and now it prickled as it 'woke up.' It was nearly five thirty, and the other first years were already at the dinner table. Harry slid in to the empty spot between Blaise and Daniel, and across from Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle.

"Look, it's Potter," Draco said with a slight smile. "Back from the hospital?"

"Yes," said Harry with a polite smile in return. He turned to Blaise, who he doubted would respond as the boy was already eating in his customary silence, but was a good deal more pleasant than Draco and company. "Professor Snape banned me from flying."

Blaise choked on his potatoes, spitting a piece out so forcefully it landed on Goyle's plate. As he coughed, Daniel Harper exclaimed, "C—can he even do that?"

Harry turned to her, surprised. In the week of class he hadn't spoken to her at all, but he supposed that could be taken that to be a result of her shyness. "I, uh, dunno," he stammered out. Regaining his composure, he quickly revised this—"Well, he is house head…"

"You don't have to go to the lessons anymore?" Blaise demanded. His blue eyes were wide as Harry to turned back to his furious friend.

"I know; it's terrible!" Harry moaned. Blaise grabbed Harry's shoulders and shook his friend back and forth vigorously.

"Terrible!" he practically shouted. "They push the practices up to begin our first week and you've already found a way out!"

"You make it sound like I wanted―"

The two boys suddenly flinched into the table as with two sharp _thunk_s a book was batted against the back of their heads. Rubbing their tender scalps sourly, the pair looked up to find Rose glowering down at them admits the laughter of the nearby students who had played witness.

"You're making a scene!" she snapped angrily. "Sit properly and eat your meals in peace!"

She stormed down the table, Harry and Blaise watching as she flung herself into her customary seat across from Adrian at the table's end. "What's got Rose's banshee screaming?" grumbled Blaise, turning back around. Harry furrowed his brow at the strange line, but said nothing.

"So you can't fly anymore, Potter," cut in Draco. "What are you going to do on Fridays, then?"  
>Harry shrugged; he hadn't thought about it. "Homework, I suppose."<p>

Blaise was still fuming beside him. "Homework?" he demanded. "You get to do homework while I have to be thrown through the air on those stupid splinters..."

"You're just afraid you're going to fall off again," Pansy, sitting on Blaise's other side, taunted.

"Oh please, Parkinson," said Blaise crossly. "Who was it who had a nervous breakdown when they posted that we'd be flying this week instead of next?"

"At least I stayed on my broom!" Pansy huffed. She crossed he arms across her chest and glared down at her food as though it were the one mocking her.

"Really, though, Harry," said Tracey Davis from Daniel's other side, ignoring Pansy's fuming. "It's a shame you aren't allowed; you were the best on a broom out there. Any chance Professor Snape will allow you back in later? I mean, it wasn't your fault Blaise's broom started chasing you like that―and it was the Professor who blew it up."

"I dunno," Harry said glumly. Maybe I'll ask him after the weekend."

"So did you hear about the break-out from Gringotts?" Draco cut in conversationally.

In the meantime, Harry served himself some creamed corn and fresh baked bread, but he could only manage a few bites through his lost appetite. After a minute of picking at the corn and listening to Draco theorize over who could have broken into a top-security vault—"_Father always says that Mudungus Fletcher is no good—you know, that squeamish man always hanging around Knockturn Alley?"—_Harry gave up. Blaise had also stopped eating, as apparently another rule of his eating was that if he stopped once he wouldn't start again. Harry nudged him and said quietly, "Hey, let's go back to the common room."

The other boy nodded and together they slipped away from Draco, who was now arguing with Pansy about what could have been in the vault. When they rounded the corner, Blaise let out a long breath. "Glad to be free of them," he grumbled. Harry blinked.

"Who? Draco?"

"And his little lackeys. Mudungus Fletcher? Really?"

"Oh—I was wondering who that was."

"A _nobody_," Blaise stressed. "There's no way someone like _him_ could've broken into somewhere like Gringotts. Mum calls him a no good slimy flobberworm—he tried to sell my us some china last year—he'd stolen it from the Hales' summer home; my brother recognized it right away."

"So he _is_ a thief? Why's Draco wrong, then?"

"Well, sure, he's a thief, but he's small time. Only takes from people who've already invited him in, right? Nowhere near _Gringotts_ material, if you know what I mean."

Harry didn't, but he set that aside. "So who do _you_ think it was?"

Blaise shrugged. "Could be anyone," he said vaguely. "I mean, it's probably one of those 'criminals at large' _The Prophet_'s always on about—or maybe one of them who kept out of Azkaban…"

"_Az_… what?"

Blaise sighed, annoyed. "Azkaban. Wizard's prison." He glared angrily at the wall before them, as though it were challenging him. "_Salazar!"_

"But what do you mean, 'one of them'?" Harry urged as they stepped through into the hallway that led to the Slytherin common room. Blaise sighed again.

"You ask a lot of questions, you know," he snapped. This made Harry laugh a bit; Blaise did a lot of talking whether he asked his questions or not, but Harry wasn't about to say that. They crossed to the open leather couches in front of one of the fireplaces that lined the walls of the low-ceilinged, elegant room and flung themselves down on them. "After the Dark Lord was… defeated—" Blaise did not so much as try to hide his glance up at Harry's scar "—loads of _his_ bunch claimed they were cursed so they didn't get time in Azkaban. Of course, there was no way to prove it, so some of the more, well, wealthy got off easy. But even more got sent to Azkaban who hadn't done anything…" He trailed off.

"Wasn't this all ten years ago?" Harry asked warily. "How come you know so much about it?"

Blaise groaned. "If you'd grown up in the wizarding world like you should've, you'd know all about the war, too," he grumbled. "I mean, it's not like we spend ten years doing _nothing_. We're supposed to be homeschooled. My brother did most of that for me, when he came back home at the holidays. We're told the same old story about the war—Voldemort bad, Ministry good—as soon as it can be a bedtime story for us."

Harry shifted nervously in his seat. He wasn't sure how he felt about being part of a bedtime story for wizards all across Britain, but with Blaise as testy as he was, the boy wasn't about to say anything. "Besides," the boy was continuing, "It'd take someone of Azkaban material to try and break in somewhere like Gringotts. Once you get in, there's no getting out."

Harry nodded. "Those goblins did look pretty frightening."

For the first time since the flying lesson, Blaise laughed. "The goblins? They're the _least_ of your worries. My brother says they've got a _dragon_ on the lower levels…"

Harry listened, transfixed, as Blaise rambled on about the different defenses at Gringotts. There was so much about the wizarding world he could not even imagine, and yet here he was, living in it! Harry shook his head, urging the tiredness from his eyes—it had been a long week.

"So," said Blaise suddenly, catching Harry's attention again. "We were going to practice for charms, right?"

"Oh, yeah!" Harry replied, mustering some enthusiasm. "Should we go get our books? We could practice in the dormitory."

"Nah, I don't want Draco running in on us," Blaise said certainly. "Wouldn't it be priceless to show up in class and be able to do the charms perfectly while he sits there looking like an idiot?"

Harry laughed nervously. "Well, what about the books, then?"

"Oh, well, that—hey, Harper!"

Harry turned around to see Daniel and Tracey Davis crossing the common room towards them. "Yeah, Zabini?" Daniel asked with an unimpressed raise of one eyebrow.

"You've got your bag still—can we borrow your charms book?"

"What for?" asked Tracey. "You've got your own, right?"

"Yeah, but they're up in the dormitory, and we want to slip out before Draco and co get back."

"What for?" demanded Tracey again.

"We're just going to do a bit of practicing," Harry insisted quietly.

Blaise glared at him, but quickly carried on. "So, can we?"

The girls glanced at each other. "Well, we're coming with you, of course."

"Now look here, Harper—"

"Didn't you see Draco just about finishing up when we were leaving, Tracey?" Daniel asked he friend sweetly.

"Oh, yes," the blond girl replied. "And Pansy was lecturing Crabbe and Goyle so fiercely about the dangers of being fat they almost stopped eating, too!"

Blaise made a sound that was something like a growl, but Harry quickly cut in. "Oh, come on, Blaise," he mediated. "It's just this once. Where can we practice?"

"I think there are a few empty classrooms just upstairs," suggested Tracey. Still grumbling, Blaise agreed and led them out of the common room.

Though they had to dodge around a corner to avoid being spotted by Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle as the trio descended the stairs to the dungeons, they quickly found a likely hallway. As they checked the doors, Harry noticed that it was the same hallway Adrian had chased him into earlier that week, but said nothing.

"This one's open!" Tracey called. The four quickly made their way into the empty room, which was also, unfortunately, quite dark.

"Hang on," said Harry. "I think the spell is… _lumos!"_

The tip of his wand glowed with a wavering light that they used to find a lantern. "Oh, I think it's the seventh year potions lab," said Blaise lowly as the light caught on a row of black cauldrons. "Hopefully LaConner doesn't get the urge to brew any poison tonight—my brother says he likes to find people to test his experiments on… oh, there's the lantern!" Blaise took it down and carried it out into the hallway to light it with one of the torches.

"Where'd you learn that spell?" Daniel whispered.

"Some of the older students were practicing it in the common room the other evening," he whispered back. But he frowned. "Theirs were much brighter, though. It was kind of annoying."

Blaise came back in carrying the lantern, which he hung back up. It was obviously enchanted, as the single candle flame fully lit the room. He quickly shut the door. "So, my brother says that Flitwick teaches us Slytherins and the Ravenclaws a few spells first because we can _handle_ them earlier. The Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs have to learn the _basics_ first—_they_ don't even understand how to wave their wands correctly!"

Harry decided it would be best if he didn't mention that until their charms class he hadn't had a clue how to wave his wand—somehow he'd missed it when looking through his books back at the Dursleys'. "Are we going to be learning what they are?" he asked rather anxiously. He certainly didn't want to miss anything this early on.

"Yeah," said Blaise. "My brother says that we spend the first few weeks learning simple charms, and then we go back and do what the others are doing. But we do it in half the time."

Tracey frowned. "So, what are we going to practice?" she asked impatiently. "I mean, only you got the levitating spell right in class, Blaise. Can't you show us how?"

"I got it too!" Harry insisted. "Blaise showed me how before flying today."

Blaise flinched at the mention of flying again, but said nothing of it. "Well, show me what you can do," he gave in. The two girls pulled out their wands, pointing at some dusty old potions books that had been left on the table. Daniel went first.

"_Win…wingardium leviosa!_" she said falteringly. The book didn't move.

"You can't stammer a spell!" Blaise groaned. "You'll hurt someone! Say it properly!"

She tried again, but this time her incantation came out as a question—"_Wingardium leviosa?"_

"Wait, I think I've got it!' said Harry suddenly. The other three looked at him curiously. "Daniel, you—you like to fly, right?"

She blinked. "Well, yeah," she said, her voice suddenly free of the nerves that seemed to inhibit her spell casting.

"I noticed today—the brooms seemed to _know_ if you really wanted to be flying!" Harry exclaimed. The others continued to stare at him. "I mean, what if spells are the same?" he finished lamely, realizing how un-backed his so-called 'revelation' was.

Yet Daniel seemed to take it to heart. She stared at the book for a minute, then, with a bit more force—though her voice still wavered—she tried again. "_Wingardium Leviosa!"_ the book rose slowly into the air, to her wide-eyed amazement.

"_Wingardium Leviosa!"_ she exclaimed quite confidently. The book gave a violent shudder, rose about a foot in the air-ignoring completely the direction by Tracey's wand—and with a _snap!_ the cover fell off and the pages landed in a heap on top of it. For a moment the room was completely silent. Then Harry and Blaise caught each other's' eyes and burst into laughter, quickly joined by Daniel. "It's not funny you guys!" Tracey said, face flushed.

"Oh, no, that was most definitely priceless!" Blaise managed between laughs. "Give it another go, though... how about that stool?"

This time the leg snapped off the stool. "Um... aren't we going to get in trouble for this?" Daniel asked between giggles.

"Oh, wait," said Harry. "We saw Rose use a spell earlier... what was it, Blaise?"

"_Reparo_, I think."

"Can I see your book, Daniel?" The girl withdrew their charms text from her bag and together they poured through it, searching for the spell. "Look, there it is!" Harry exclaimed. "_Reparo—_the mending charm."

Blaise peered over his shoulder. "Well that doesn't look too hard. What's the wand movement?" He followed the diagrams to move his wand in a sort of four-pointed spiral. "It really doesn't look so bad. And it's right near the front of the book... it can't be _that_ much harder than levitation..."

"Well, go on, then!" said Harry. "You're the best of us at spells, right? Try it on the stool."

Blaise looked pleased at the compliment, and turned around. "_Reparo,"_ he tried valiantly—but to no avail: the stool was pushed back a few feet, but the leg was nowhere near re-attached.

"No, look, you've got the wand-motion backwards," Harry said. "Go the other way."

Blaise tried again, with much more force in his incantation: "_Reparo!"_

This time the leg went shooting into the stool with such force that the end splintered a bit and it jutted out at an awkward angle, but it stuck. Blaise grinned. "See, it's not so hard!" he exclaimed. "I mean, sure it's a little beat up, but no one will notice!" But Daniel didn't look so impressed.

"Oh, please," she said a bit saucily, surprising Harry once again. "Anyone who doesn't notice that would have to be blind!"

Blaise rounded on her. "Is that right, Harper? And I suppose you think _you_ can do it better?"  
>The timid girl straightened up a bit. "As a matter of fact I do!" Her conviction for once set plainly on her face, she brandished her wand at the stool. "<em>Reparo!"<em>

Her spell had a much smoother nature about it as the splinters slid back into place and the crooked leg straightened out. She crossed her arms across her chest triumphantly. "So, Zabini? Still proud?"

"Ha!" the boy spat. The venom in his voice surprised Harry; he could not understand why the shy girl and amiable boy were glaring at each other so fiercely. "All you did was bump it a bit; any half-rate squib could've done that!" He pointed at the book in a heap on the table. "_Repar—_"

"Wait!" broken Harry abruptly. "I've just remembered—on the train that Granger girl used _reparo_ on my glasses!"

"So?" asked Tracey. "What does that stupid Gryffindor have to do with this?"

Harry glanced at her; he didn't know the girl well enough to say what sort of resentment she held against Hermione—probably no more than the usual Slytherin view of Gryffindors that he'd come to expect. "So she didn't just say '_reparo'_ when she did it—it was something like… _oculs reparo?_"

"Could it have been '_oculos,' _Harry?" Blaise asked. Harry shrugged. "It's Latin, I think… my brother says that most spells are." He turned thoughtfully back to the book, and raised his wand. "_Biblos reparo!"_ The pages slid back into a neat stack and the cover snapped back on. He grinned and tossed it to Harry. "Good as new!"

But Daniel snatched it out of the boy's hands. "As new?" she challenged. She stomped towards Blaise and fanned it open in front of him. "Yeah, because new books are always printed with their covers upside-down!"

Blaise opened his mouth into a gape, looking at the book before him. When he realized he'd let it hang open stupidly, he promptly clamped it shut, only to open it again to retort when Harry, grinning, cut him off. "Guys, cut it out," he laughed. "Come on, aren't we supposed to be smoothening our levitation?"

Blaise turned back to him, suddenly all smiles. "Yeah, we're going to get it down for sure!" he exclaimed. Daniel rolled her eyes, but the boy seemed keen on ignoring her. "And now we can even fix whatever we break—good thinking, Harry! Now come on, Tracey, let's see you try it again! Try that quill, it's nice and small."

And so the quartet returned to their practice, Harry and Daniel taking turns fixing whatever Tracey broke while Blaise read off tips from the charms book. Within half an hour, she managed to control the direction of the spell while only bending the quill in two, rather than making the hairs of the feather fall off, and Harry was confident he could repair feathers in a heartbeat, if nothing else. When Tracey got tired of dancing the feather about as Blaise gave her advice, he and Harry filled two spare beakers with water and flew them about the classroom, competing over who could make his move the fastest without spilling, making the two girls laugh as they narrowly avoided slamming the beakers into each other. They were doing well until Blaise lost control and his went flying into the door—only the door wasn't shut.

Snape's wand was out so fast Harry wondered if he hadn't been holding it already when he came in. The beaker came to a halt in front him and with a wave of his wand Snape summoned the water that had frozen midair in the beaker's flight trail back into the glass container. Harry realized as the Potions Master regarded the frozen first years with arched eyebrows that his beaker was still floating, and quickly jerked his wand down, making the beaker hit the table with unnecessary force.

"Dare I ask," Snape said quietly in the silence that followed. "What it is you were doing?" The group stared at him with sudden guilt, as though they hadn't been practicing but breaking some rule. In their silence, Snape's gaze fell on Daniel, who stood with the book, which had, during the course of Tracey's practice, lost its cover again, in her hands. "Miss Harper? Perhaps you would like to explain?"

"We… we were…" she stammered. "P-practicing our charms, sir."

The Professor's brows reached new heights on his pale brow. "Practicing?" he regarded the chipped beakers suspiciously. "To my interrupting eyes it looked less like _practicing _and more like doing damage to school property."

"Oh, but sir, we did look up the repairing charm so we could fix everything!" Blaise exclaimed, suddenly finding his voice again. "Really, you can't even tell half the things we've broken. That quill looks as good as new, right?"

Snape was unimpressed. "Show me—fix that book, Mr. Potter."

This was clearly one of those times Snape would be more than willing to hand out a detention—Harry swallowed. He took the book from Daniel and set it on the stool, pointing his wand. "_Biblos reparo!"_ Much to his relief, the cover quickly sewed itself back to the pages, and it sat on the stool looking just the same as the first years had found it, if a bit less dusty. The four let out a collective sigh of relief, as though they had all been holding their breath in anticipation, but they quickly remembered that Snape still stood in the doorway and turned back to him.

"Very well," the man said with a sudden coldness. "You may return to the common room—curfew is in five minutes. But for future reference—" he continued, blocking their exit as the group tried to scurry past him "—magic is to be practiced with one's own belongings, and not in classrooms where potions are brewing. If you wish to practice again, there is an unused room two doors down that I will leave unlocked for you. If I catch you in this room again," his eyes darted down to Harry, "I assure you, you will be punished accordingly." With that he stepped aside and let them pass, closing the door behind them.


	9. In Which an Oversized Bird Causes Less

_Hello, my dears. Yes, you are my dears now. Why? Because you have an overabundance of patience!_

_I did say I would try to get done over break, but (obviously) did not go as planned. Ah, well. In any case, thank you so much for all the story favorites and reviews! You guys encourage me so much!_

_On a chapter specific related note, if you do not enjoy run-on sentences, please avoid the first few paragraphs. They may give you headaches. Just know that I did alter the third and fourth paragraphs from single sentences to full paragraphs… not that that is any excuse!_

_As always, please read, enjoy, and review!_

**Chapter Nine: In Which an Oversized Bird Causes Less Trouble than a Cotton Swab**

"_Blaise Zabini, you give that back right now_!"

Harry grinned, watching Blaise use his superior height to his advantage over Pansy. It was Wednesday, at lunch, and the daily owls had just arrived with the mail. Harry doubted the Dursleys would ever send him anything, but Draco and Tracey were among those who had received one nearly every other day.

Pansy had just received mail from and elegant looking bird of the like Harry had never seen before. Its head bore a strange plume that dangled before its face like an angler fish's light, only its pattern was like a peacock's feather centered with a silver so shiny it reflected the hall like a mirror. It had jabbed its foot aggressively at Pansy, grabbing beak-full after beak-full of bacon until Pansy's trembling fingers had untied the velvet pouch from its leg. When she deposited three sickles, it stretched its wings to their full span, punching Crabbe and Goyle, who had not been fast enough to dodge, out of their seats and with a force that knocked all the nearby platters over plunged into the air and out of the Great Hall.

(Rose, who had been passing, was furious: it had taken her all of thirty seconds' wand-work to set everything back in order, down to Goyle's untucked shirt and Crabbe's loose tie. Now the green and silver striped garment was pulled so tight about his chubby neck the boy was turning a most peculiar shade of purple.)

"My dearest Pansy, I've been missing you―oh, you've got a boyfriend, don't you?" Blaise grinned viciously, holding the letter out of the girl's reach.

"What?" demanded Draco, reaching across the table to snatch it away. "Give that here..."

"DRACO!

"...missing you here in France―"

"A French boyfriend!" called out Blaise and Tracey at the same time. It was Tracey's turn to grab at the letter.

"_Tracey_?"

"I've begun making the necessary arrangements for you to visit over the holidays―that's so sweet!"

"Sweet?" chortled Draco.

"More like scandalous!" cried Blaise. He stood on the bench and leaned over Harry and Daniel to grab the letter back.

"Oh, give it back to her, guys..." said Daniel. Her voice was quiet, but she swatted at Blaise's arm.

"Don't be such a pansy, Harper," growled Goyle. For a moment they all stared at him―usually his comments were confined to grunts and threats to get his homework done by the others, and most definitely not containing any wit. But then Blaise started to read again.

"I'll send one of the servants to pick you up from the station―"

"A rich French boyfriend!" Tracey squealed.

But the table's laughter had died. They all shared a tight lipped silence as Adrian, the letter in hand, scanned it briefly. He had taken over their grins, wearing one of his own that made him resemble a shark.

"My Dearest Pansy," he began in a mocking tone. "I cannot see you very often because I'm a known psychopath who would be beset by aurors the moment I set foot in Britain, and while those aurors are just so juicy of meat I'd rather not lose my sanctuary in France. I'll send some lackeys to spirit you away from the Station so that you can bring us vital information about the ministry's security so that I may go on yet another murdering spree. Your loving sister, Violet." Adrian chuckled to himself and let the letter fall to the ground. "Oh, do give Vi my good word in your reply, Parkinson?" He sauntered off down the table, the first years staring after him in a confused hypnosis.

Their immobility was broken a moment later, and Pansy snatched the letter from the floor and sat back down in a fuming silence. Even Blaise sunk back down off the bench, somewhat subdued. But Tracey, it seemed, was the quickest to shake off Adrian's residual effect. "Jeez, what was that about?" she said, tossing her blond curls over her shoulder. "Pass the chips, Draco."

The boy complied, and they all set about eating―including Blaise, meaning the volume of their section was a good deal lower than it had been all lunch.

"What do we have this afternoon?" asked Harry between bites of some strange meaty pudding Blaise had dished out for him. Harry hadn't forgotten―rather, now that the distraction of Pansy's letter was over, he was almost twice as excited as before.

"Double Transfiguration," supplied Draco.

Even though he was still eating and so not talking, they could all see how Blaise straightened up at the word. In fact, Harry, Daniel, and Tracey all couldn't help but perk up at the reminder. This was their first Transfiguration class of the week, and the four students couldn't wait to get there―Draco stared at them blankly.

"Did I miss something, or do you all actually look excited about that Gryffindor-loving old hag's class?" he demanded.

Harry laughed. "Not her class, really..." he said as vaguely as he could muster.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Blaise apparently couldn't hold himself back any longer. He swallowed his last bit of sandwich quickly so that he could join back into the conversation. "We can't tell you, Draco," he explained in a manner that explained nothing at all. "If we did we'd give it all away!"

"Give what all away?" asked Pansy. She, too, couldn't hold up her silent pout.

Suddenly Daniel spoke up, startling Harry. For all her quiet attitude and silence during classes, she really did speak more often than Harry expected―he wondered if he'd ever get used to that.

"Well, none of us like Granger, right?" she asked, though she really didn't need to: the table collectively grimaced. "So we thought we'd show her up in... Our own way. And if she overreacts, well, it won't be our fault, right?"

Draco raised his eyebrows sharply. "So you're going to show that stupid Mudblood up?" he demanded. Harry resisted the urge to flinch at the word; somehow every time he heard it he couldn't help but feel his mother had to be turning in her grave. He pushed the feeling aside and put on a fresh smile, reminding himself that it was Granger Draco was insulting. That thought made him forget his unease as he nodded.

"It's about time we showed her who's worthy to be at Hogwarts," Draco said shrewdly. "Father says there shouldn't even be any muggle-borne at Hogwarts anyways. Salazar Slytherin didn't want them here." He shrugged off the thought. "But what are you planning on doing?"

Blaise laughed. "We can't tell you, friend!" he insisted. "If we did we'd be ruining everything! But how about instead I'll tell you what my brother told me about some of the pranks he's pulled on the Hufflepuffs who wanted help with their homework. There was this one time..."

Friend. The word struck Harry like a blow to the gut. Was that what he should consider Draco now? Before coming to Hogwarts, Dudley had made sure that Harry would never have any friend, but now he had Blaise―and he though Tracey and Daniel, too, though Tracey was none too bright and Daniel impossible to read. But Harry wasn't sure he wanted Draco as a friend. Maybe it was his superior attitude, or that he only seemed to address Harry to suck up to the boy or insult him. Or perhaps it was his continued struggling in charms, making him less than impressive in the face of the four Slytherins who had spent the last to periods giving the Ravenclaws bogus advise as they attempted to scare Flitwick by brushing him with their feathers. It could, Harry supposed, also be his continued bragging about his flight skills, which, now that Harry had seen them first-hand, were less impressive than his own or the less boastful Daniel's...

"...isn't that right, Harry?"

The eleven year old blinked, brought out of his daze by the energetic Blaise. Realizing he was expected to answer, Harry quickly shrugged. Blaise seemed satisfied and turned back to Draco, who was unimpressed.

"Well, if I had been sorted into Ravenclaw, my Father would have had something to say about it," he said coolly. "He's old friends with the headmaster of Durmstrang―Igor Karkarov, you've heard of him? If mother hadn't wanted me to stay in Britain, I'd already have transferred there... They don't try to pass off cracks like Quirrell for their professors, and," his voice quieted but seemed to fill with a strange pride, "They teach the Dark Arts themselves to the older students. Not this so-called 'defense' nonsense." He had been leaning forward to deliver this detail and seemed pleased by the raised eyebrows of his audience.

"Real magic," Crabbe agreed.

"None of the Ravenclaws have enough guts to study anything that could be a bit dangerous!" Blaise declared. "Even my brother relies too much on his books―like that Granger girl..."

The whole table stiffened. Harry was beginning to get the picture. "Well, it's not like the sorting hat doesn't give you a choice," he said slowly.

Blaise raised an eyebrow. "A choice?" he repeated. "What do you mean?"

The table was staring at Harry intently, and he blinked. "The hat didn't talk to any of you?" he asked. But he knew the answer before he even finished. In sorting, the hat had barely touched the others' heads before calling out 'Slytherin!'

But Daniel spoke up again. "It gave me a riddle," she offered.

Harry frowned. "A riddle? What sort?"

It was her turn to shrug, but her skin turned a shade darker with her blush. "I told it to stop mucking around and put me in the best house."

They all laughed, to the girl's increased embarrassment. "No wonder you're in Slytherin, then," said Draco. "And you, Harry? Did it give you a riddle?"

Harry shook his head. "No, it just started talking about what sort of wizard I'd make. Told me I'd be better off in Slytherin, then gave me a choice, I suppose."

"What was your other choice?" asked Draco. His eyes seemed to pierce Harry with expectations.

"Oh, Ravenclaw, of course!" lied Harry. He knew enough after a week with the Slytherins to know he wouldn't want to mention Gryffindor, or that the hat had, technically, tricked him into Slytherin.

"Of course you chose Slytherin, then," said Draco. "Anyone with any pride in being a wizard would!"

_Pride_?

The bells rang and the benches of the Great Hall's four long tables scraped back across the floor loudly as the students hurried to join the rush out. As Harry and Blaise made their way to the group, a sudden influx of screeches sounded, followed by laughter. Harry looked to Blaise, but the boy only shrugged; neither of them could see over the crowd.

"Move along! Get to class!" Percy Weasley's voice sounded over the laughter. The crowd quickly filtered away, clearly not wanting to deal with the high-strung boy.

Or that was what the boys thought until they made it through the doors and came in view of the whole scene. Rose was brandishing her wand at Peeves, casting some sort of shielding spell around him that kept the ghost contained. "PEEVES!" she bellowed as he flung himself against the magical walls. "DO I NEED TO FETCH THE BLOODY BARON?"

Percy and two other prefects were helping a group of soaked Ravenclaw girls collect their soaked items. The Weasley suddenly glared up at them, shoving the papers off onto the angry girls. "Why didn't you stop him, LaConner?" he demanded.

Harry blinked, but quickly realized that Adrian was leaning against the wall beside the doors to the great hall. The older boy replied quiet coolly. "What makes you think I would have wanted to?"

"No need for that, Miss Hawthorne," whined Peeves. "Just let me out!"

They heard Adrian sigh. "Besides, it was quite funny, until you lot started all this nonsense. Come now, Rose, let him out. We have a game of chess that needs finishing."

Rose looked over at Adrian with a harsh glare, opening her mouth, but seemed to catch herself in time to hold her tongue. "The Baron will hear about this, Peeves!" she called, releasing her spell with a swish of her wand. She pivoted about and glared at Harry and Blaise, who had paused at the foot of the stairs to watch the scene unfold. "Get a move on it, Potter, Zabini!"

They quickly scampered away, not wanting to be late to Transfiguration.

"Late to the second day of class?" Professor McGonagall reprimanded as the pair skidded into the room on the last toll of the bell. "Ten points from Slytherin. Take a seat."

Harry and Blaise quickly took the last seats available in the room—one of the middle tables. But they weren't about to complain. They were sitting right behind Hermione, and while her hair certainly made it difficult for them to see the board they had an excellent view of her match.

"Now, you've had five whole days, I expect at least some of you have progressed on your matches? Perhaps some of you can even demonstrate a full transfiguration for the class?" the Professor asked, right on cue. Harry barely held back his grin as Hermione thrust her hand into the air proudly. Blaise and he already had their wants out under the desk.

"Very well, Miss Granger, if you please?"

The girl cleared her throat, tossing her hair importantly. She waved her wand rhythmically, and said in her clearest voice—"_astula verto_!"

Unbeknownst to her—or anyone, for that matter, both Harry and Blaise and whispered at the same time, "_Scribblifors_!" Hermione's jaw dropped as, rather than sharpening or turning at all metallic, the match abruptly grew into a snowy-white quill.

It took a moment, but the class burst into laughter. "Nice one, Granger!" called one Gryffindor, only to be fixed with one of McGonagall's signature disapproving stares.

"Very funny, Mr. Finnegan," she snapped, waving he wand lazily to turn the quill back into a match. "Again, Miss Granger."

This time Hermione's voice was rather squeaky. "_Astula Verto_!"

The matchstick turned into a cotton swab, complete with earwax.

Harry couldn't help but grin over the snickers and looked over to catch Daniel's eye—she was slipping her wand back into her cloak sleeve. But his glance was cut short by McGonagall—

"Mr. Potter, Mr. Zabini, as the two of you seem to find this so very amusing, perhaps you'd like to demonstrate for the class?"

The pair looked at each other and shrugged, doing their best to keep their faces straight. "Which of us would you, Professor?" asked Blaise amiably.

She pursed her lips, nostrils flaring. "How kind of you to volunteer, Mr. Zabini."

Blaise drew his wand from his cloak—when he'd replace it Harry didn't know, but he was quickly regretting not thinking of it himself—and said in as bored a tone as he could muster, "_Astula verto_."

How the professor could manage any more disapproval in her expression Harry did not know, but as Blaise's matchstick grew thinner, rounder, and sharper he could almost see the veins on her forehead waiting to burst. "And you, Mr. Potter!" she commanded.

Harry shrugged and attempted the same nonchalance that Blaise had so masterfully displayed. "_Astula verto_."

Though McGonagall thoroughly inspected their needles, she could find nothing to critique about them. The boys had made sure of that—ever since Blaise suggested they as Slytherins should show the Gryffindors which house was better he, Harry, Daniel, and Tracey had been practicing until they could make their matches into needles of all different sizes. Should anyone look into the classroom Professor Snape had advised them to use, they would wonder whether someone with an overwhelming amount of earwax had started a sewing club. On further inspection, they would be particularly confused by those cotton swabs that seemed rather to be steel wool swabs, from Daniel's earlier attempts at the spell they'd found in the back of _101 Prank Spells Every Wizard Should Know_, which Blaise had borrowed from his brother.

"Very well," said the Professor quietly. "I suppose you've earned back the ten points you lost at the beginning of class." Harry couldn't help but grin again—he wouldn't want Professor Snape getting after him for losing points for the house. "However," she continued, not letting them dwell on their little victory for long, "You have also earned yourselves detention for disruptive behavior in the classroom. Let's say... This Friday afternoon?"

It was clearly supposed to be a harsh punishment, as she timed it perfectly to overlap with Flying but apparently McGonagall hadn't heard that Harry had been banned from the class by Professor Snape or that Blaise had been trying to think of ways to get himself banned all week. Though Draco, seated next to Pansy in the back corner, whispered quite loudly to the girl about favoritism, the boys did not complain, and McGonagall began her lecture with increased furiousity.

For homework, they were assigned to write two scrolls on improper uses of magic, with particular focus on the punishments for them.

Yet Harry and Blaise sauntered out of class feeling quite proud of themselves. They joined Daniel and Tracey with silent grins, but did not dare speak out so close to the classroom.

But Hermione was not so keen to avoid them. With Neville Longbottom in tow she blocked a doorway to stand storming in the quartet's path.

"Oh look," said Blaise humorously. "It's Gryffindor's brightest squib—oh, and Longbottom, too."

"How did you do it?" Hermione demanded furiously, ignoring the boy's wit. "I've read through our year's transfiguration text twice, and there were no spells for _that_ sort of cheap magic in there!"

"Cheap magic?" demanded Tracey. She flushed as she remembered too many failed attempts at the quill-making spell. "I'd like to see _you_ pull them off."

"Maybe you need to expand your reading list," added Harry, though from the three hefty library volumes she hadn't managed to fit into her book bag he doubted that were the case.

Hermione wrinkled her nose in disgust. "Well, I will not be wasting _my_ time with such filthy magic—"

"Filthy magic?" repeated Daniel, quietly, coldly. "No matter what magic comes from our wands, it will never be so filthy as magic from yours."

Harry didn't get it, but from the sudden gawk that Hermione's face seemed fixed in whatever insult the quiet girl had intended was certainly serious.

"For once Harper has managed to make a good point!" declared Blaise. "Now if you could step aside, some of us use doorways to pass through, not to contaminate."

Hermione continued to gawk at them for a minute, but then she gnashed her teeth together and glared at Harry. "You of all people!" she snapped at him. "Honestly, from all that I've read I would have expected you to be—at least in some way—"

Harry almost thought he saw tears in the girl's eyes as she wheeled about and ran across the courtyard, hugging her books tightly to her chest. Neville took only one glance at the Slytherins and turned quickly to trip after her.

"Well that was rude," commented Tracey. "Potions next, right?"

They were the first into the classroom, preferring to spend their twenty minute break discussing what spells they could try out next than loitering in the halls with their classmates. Or they thought, at least, that they were alone as they lay claim to their seats, but then Professor Snape stepped out of the storage room. He did not look altogether thrilled to see them.

"Don't you four want to be out in the hallways while you still have the time?" he asked in a monotone.

As usual, it was Blaise who first addressed the Professor for the group. Harry was still angry about flying lessons, Daniel was too quiet in speaking to the adults for anyone to hear, and Tracey was—well, Harry doubted she could think of an answer to the question, frankly. But Blaise was both confident and quick thinking, if a bit verbose.

"Quite frankly, sir, the classroom is a much better place for us," he said with his easy grin. "Out in the hallways we can hardly hear each other, and Harry here seems to attract enough attention for us to not be able to go ten feet without someone listening in. Not that it is particularly necessary that we aren't overheard, of course, but it is certainly annoying and—"

"I hope it wasn't your tongue that landed you and Mr. Potter in detention, Mr. Zabini," Snape cut in with a raised eyebrow. That certainly quieted the boy, and Harry wondered at his embarrassment—but he was more amazed that the man had already heard about their punishment.

"No, sir," said Harry, braving his nerves around the potions master. "We just..."

"We showed that Granger girl who's who!" declared Tracey. She had a grin on her face now, seeming completely at ease confessing to the teacher. "She won't be so eager to show off her so-called skills now!"

A slight smile ghosted Snape's face. "And how, exactly, did you do that?"

"Harry and Blaise turned her matchstick into a quill when she was trying to show off in front of the class!" Tracey replied. The boys flinched at her chatty admission, but the professor just glanced at them without reprimand. "And when she tried again Daniel turned it into a cotton swab—a really gross one! McGonagall thought it was those two again and made them do the needle spell, but even though they did it right she still gave them detention."

"A cotton swab?" repeated Snape. His eyes looked almost lazily back at the boys. "Surely you two could have thought of something better than a quill?"

"We were thinking of blowing it up, sir, but Daniel said that might be vandalism," said Harry. "Besides, we couldn't find a good spell for it."

Snape's other eyebrow darted up, but as Draco, Pansy, Crabbe, and Goyle entered the room his face relaxed back to apathy.

"If I may suggest keeping your showing up of Miss Granger out of the classroom," the man advised, turning away. "Detention your second week of school will not reflect well on you in the future,

I am afraid."

"Good afternoon, Professor," fretted Malfoy, choosing the desk next to the boys'.

"Mr. Malfoy," the man replied, but he was already sweeping back into the storage room.

When Harry turned to face Draco, he found the boy beaming with an enthusiasm he never mustered unless the recipient of his emotion was himself. "You were right," he declared. "Knowing about it ahead of time would have ruined the fun. Congratulations, that was _brilliant._"

The rest of the class began filtering into the room, so they took their seats quietly, but did not even bother to try keeping the smug looks off their faces. When Hermione came in with the final bell, Blaise nudged Harry. He was grinning as he nodded towards the girl. Harry looked up at her, and felt a jolt of satisfaction at her raised shoulders and jerking movements. Yet when she turned to grab the books out of her bag and he caught sight of the red rims around her puffy eyes, he couldn't help but wonder what he'd gotten himself into.


	10. In Which Rules are Bent and Ribs Broken

_Subtitle: Some People are Very, Very Violent, and Others Have Severe Personality Issues. Others Have Both. The Rose Arc: Part I._

_In other words: I've gotten a few questions regarding Rose' and Adrian's characters. As Rose plays a key role in Harry's early life as a Slytherin, we now embark on the two-part "Rose Arc" that'll explain who these two silly fellows are—in good time._

_On the 'a few questions' note—to Nightshade, Twilight, Hortensia, and Bloody Phantom, thank you so much for reviewing! To everyone else—and I do get alerts when you watch my story, so I know you're out there—I BEG you to review and critique. Really, the main reason I'm writing this story is because my writing (obviously) needs work. So any comments regarding plot, characters, writing style, your pet goat are greatly appreciated!_

_Now I'll shut up. As always, enjoy!_

Rose Hawthorne despised flying. Flying brought back memories of a late night escape made ten years before. It had once been exciting—to her four year old self—but later, when she understood that her parents were not coming back, the trauma of the memories became associated with flying. A few years later her brother had tried to teach her to fly, and she'd made it a few feet off the mansion balcony before she'd started screaming. The broom sped off, zooming in circles until it had crashed into a tree, leaving the tiny girl dangling from the branches. The limb broke and she hit her head on the trunk and couldn't remember the incident for a whole week. When she did remember, however, she had stormed into her brother's room and lit the broomstick on fire, reducing it to nothing more than a heap of ash. It had been her first magic.

And so, Rose's first year at Hogwarts she had downright refused to go to flying lessons. It had earned her detention with Severus, sorting stunned lacewing flies by eye color for every afternoon that she was supposed to be in class. It was dreadful work that anyone fully sane would have given up, but Rose barely complained—at least she wasn't flying.

As coincidence would have it, it was also in her first year—and in fact her first week—that found Rose dangling by her ankle midair. It was unfortunate for Adrian LaConner that despite being a first-year Rose had already memorized half of the spells in The Standard Book of Spells: Grade One, and had somewhere along the lines picked up a couple of nasty, if simple, hexes. Combining the hasty magic of an uncontrolled young witch with the intensified reaction to being swept off her feet and dangled midair left Adrian's face half swollen with boils filled with yellow puss. Rose had achieved being released, falling gracelessly to the floor, but a moment later she was halfway down the hall, bleeding and unconscious on the floor.

But that was a story for another time.

With all her inhibitions towards flying, Rose felt very little pity as she looked down at Harry Potter. The boy was quite upset about losing his right to flying lessons: a deaf, blind, comatose St. Mungos' patient would have been able to sense his outrage from a mile away. At least Rose, who was contentedly relaxing in her chair until the boys had sat down, could see from her vantage point the strain in Potter's facade as he watched the other first years leaving for flying lessons.

An ungracious snort accompanied Adrian as he took his seat across the small table the pair had long since claimed as their own. "What's got Potter's panties in a bunch?" he asked Rose, kicking his feet up.

She sighed and explained everything as she best knew it: the rouge broom, Potter's fall, Severus's banning of flying practice. She had heard half of it from Severus, half from the first years in the table, but still was missing a key fact.

"It wasn't you, Adrian," she added at the end of her explanation. "Was it?"

His grey-brown eyes met her dark green ones—a good sign, as Adrian was in the habit of turning away when she'd called him out. "I'm not stupid enough to attack someone like precious Potter in front of a teacher, Rose," he said slowly. "And I am much less interested in cursing objects than cursing people. But what about the other brat—why is pretty little Zabini junior still skulking around here? Doesn't he still have lessons, even if that putz Potter got out of them?"

"They earned themselves a detention from Professor McGonagall, making trouble with that brat Granger."

Adrian laughed. "If I didn't know better, I'd say your tone is almost approving of the brats. Some sort of house-based favoritism?" he guessed. "Now isn't that a bit unfair? Haven't I always shown you that all first years are on equal grounds? Except for the _really_ bratty ones, of course."

"Well, Granger is really bratty!"

"Oh, well then something _must _be done about that! I dare say there's more than a few spells I have yet to test out, and there was that awfully botched hair-coloring potion from a few years ago that I'm sure is somewhere in my trunk-"

"Don't even think about it. My neck is on the chopping block already, and if I have to explain to Severus one more time why I couldn't keep you in line-

"Oh relax, I'll wipe her memory afterwards. No one will ever know!"

"I'm going to dinner," snapped Rose abruptly. Adrian gave her an amused look and stood with her.

"It might be dangerous to the public if you go out alone like this," he said in an almost purring voice. Reaching out he grabbed Rose's elbow, pulled her towards him, and locked their arms together. It was an awkward arrangement, as the top of the petite Rose's head reached Adrian's shoulder. Had she not known Adrian better she would have pulled away, but Rose knew that would only result in a drawn-out dance of hex and counter-curse until their arms were practically fused together. Having been to Madame Pomfrey for that very reason before, Rose decided to let Adrian have his fun.

In all truth, Rose was actually much less riled up than Adrian made her out to be. If she had been angry, she would have called out the Weasley twins, Fred and George, as they snuck out of the kitchens, arms heavily laden with cakes. She would have threatened Peeves, who was firing spit-wads at second years, with the Bloody Baron. She would have hexed Maria Dunbar when she caught of her through the window—because there was no-one who was quite so despicably dull as Maria Dunbar. But Rose didn't hex anyone, she just walked quietly up the dungeon halls into the foyer and through to the Great Hall, arms linked with Adrian's.

Rose liked to eat early on Fridays, though it was nearly five o'clock by the time they made it to the hall. Most of the younger students were still in class or outside enjoying the last of the sunny weather. Rose and Adrian sat near the end of the Slytherin table, at a segment deserted by all others except a fourth-year student reading from an old book of goblin war-lore.

"Have a good day?" Adrian asked casually, piling chow mein into a heap on his plate. Rose shrugged; it hadn't been anything special.

"How about you?" she asked. "I am glad to see you're still alive, you know—I haven't seen you since Peeve's water balloons, and Hogwarts—let alone the Slytherin House—isn't that big."

"Oh, well, I've been out causing trouble, of course." There was a sort of brisk lightness to his voice as Adrian looked up at the head table.

"You haven't been experimenting again, have you? Remember how angry Severus was when you blew up the extra potions lab?"

"There have been too many pests in that old lab for me to use, and besides, I have my own space in the NEWT lab now-the old fool is back, I see," Adrian deflected

It was first at Severus that Rose looked. He had his usual bored expression painted on his face, though he was staring down the table with a focus that he usually did not warrant in the Great Hall. She followed the look—Professor Grubbly-Plank, the substitute for care of magical creatures; Sprout, Dumbledore, Quirrel, Flitwick... Nothing out of the ordinary.

"He must have gotten back this afternoon. I didn't see him at lunch," Rose said offhandedly, remembering Adrian's comment. The comings and goings of the headmaster were of little interest to Rose. In her time at Hogwarts she had tried to spend as little time in the presence of the man as she could. In her third year Adrian and her had been sent to his office for forcing a Gryffindor girl into an unbreakable vow, but Dumbledore had not so much as raised his voice when he doled out their punishments. Severus' anger had been much more frightening, and made the whole visit to Dumbledore's office seem like a joke. It was Adrian who'd spent more time in the man's office every year than most students managed their whole time at Hogwarts.

"Haven't you noticed it?" Adrian asked, interrupting her thoughts. Rose swallowed her spaghetti too soon, but after the aid of a goblet of pumpkin juice regained her composure.

"Noticed what?" she demanded, cutting in to Adrian's fit of laughter. He waved one hand towards the high table, but still Rose saw nothing out of the ordinary.

"Snape," Adrian explained. "He only ever comes to dinner when the old joke is here."

Rose shrugged. It was true, as far as she could remember, but she couldn't see how it could be important. "So?"

Adrian was playing with his chow mein, pushing the vegetables and meat into their own piles. "Aren't you curious as to why?"

"Not really."

"Oh come on, Rose. There's got to be a reason."

"Right," said Rose. Adrian's little obsessions could get quite irritating. "If you're so curious, why don't you just ask him?"

Adrian laughed. "Of course you would suggest that. I can just see you—'Severus, why do you avoid dinner? It's not healthy to be a recluse, you know.'"

"I would not!" snapped Rose. "Because I don't care!"

At this point Rose just wanted Adrian to shut up and eat his dinner. It was a relief to see him in the flesh after the last few days of his absence as he really was her best friend, but he had no sensitivity towards other people's feelings speak of. Well, that wasn't right: he thrived off of the feelings of others. Rose's anger was highly amusing to him, almost as amusing as the fear of a first year when he caught them alone in the halls, or the girls he got too close to when they had no gut to push him away.

"But you do care, don't you?" he said maliciously. "You're always worried about Snape—"

Rose had her wand out before she could think about what she was doing. She waved it, not thinking of any spell so much as commanding Adrian up, onto the table, and spat, "_Tarentellega_!"

So he had managed to get her angry—it was worth it, watching Adrian dance about uncontrollably on the table. Rose knew there was a plethora of hexed coming to mind as he glared down at her, but with the headmaster and Severus both watching, what could he do? Amid the cheers and clapping that the student body had broken in to, Rose checked her temper, taking a deep breath before looking up to her friend.

"What a fine jig you have chosen to demonstrate, Adrian!" she exclaimed with mock surprised. "Though be careful you don't knock over the soup-oh, and now you've gone and ruined the spaghetti. What a waste. Don't you think you ought to come down?"

"What do you think you're doing, Rose!" squeaked the strained voice of Percy Weasley as he skidded to a halt across the table.

"Me?" asked Rose. "Why, I'm just eating my supper." She took a bite of spaghetti to prove her point. Percy was hardly going to fall for such a simple cover-up, and drew his wand.

"Wait-!" urged Rose, but it was too late. Adrian turned around slowly, his limbs no longer dancing, as Rose tried to slip out of her seat. Yet they were not the only trouble makers in the Great Hall that evening, and Fred and George Weasley could not have chosen a better time to activate a spell that sent the four house tables flying into the air-carrying Adrian away. Rose darted out of the hall as McGonagall came storming in brandishing her wall. She imagined it wouldn't be too much trouble for her to skirt her prefect duties this once-after all, the head boy was in the midst of the trouble, and he had more of a responsibility towards dealing with the matter than she did.

Of course, that was disregarding the fact that even wizards using tables to swordfight could not stop Adrian from chasing after the girl down the steps and through the doors into one of Hogwarts' many grassy courtyards. Rose was lucky, though; the boy's wand remained in his cloak as he tackled her to the ground.

"Not fair!" she laughed. "I'm the one in a skirt and these shoes are a pain to run in!"

"Then why do you wear them?" Adrian demanded, sitting triumphantly on her back.

"Because they're nice." Rose tried to sit up, but the boy wouldn't budge. "Adrian, you're going to get grass stains all over my cloak. Get off!"

"No, I rather like the cushioning, thanks."

"Adrian!"

"What's that? You don't mind? How considerate of you!"

Adrian did not realize that while his wand was tucked away, hers was in her sleeve, and quickly moved to her hand. She twisted her arm to point it at him. "Levi Corpus!"

It was sweet revenge, every time she used that spell on Adrian, for all the times that he had dangled her in the air. However, she couldn't hold up the spell on her stomach, so all it really did was blast the older boy into the air-and off her. He landed halfway to the stairs.

This time Rose didn't run, even though when he stood back up, glaring, he really did have his wand out. She had the upper hand, having landed the first spell. Or that was the theory, at least. It didn't help her case that he knew more than his fair share of hexes and spells that may or may not have been banned from the Hogwarts grounds in his arsenal. Rose's arm quickly grew numb as she held up her shielding spell.

"What's the matter, Rose?" the boy demanded. "Can't handle me anymore? Too chicken to take me on?"

"You wish!" snapped Rose. She made a split-second decision as he paused in his hex-hurling for his next taunt and broke her shield. "_Verso Adrian_!"

Adrian spun up into the air, twisting about and landing on the ground. He was up quickly, but Rose was moving faster. "_V__ertiginos_!"

"_Impedimenta_!"

"_Nodocrinis_!"

"What are you doing?" a shrill voice shrieked.

Rose shouldn't have let herself get distracted, but Hermione's panic was startling. She had just enough time to regain herself to shout "_Protego_!" and stop Adrian's next spell—"_Aguamenti!"_—but the force of the jet of water it produced threw her backwards. Rose pushed off the ground as quickly as she could. "_Mobiliarbus_!" she waved her wand at a nearby tree, which transplanted itself in front of Adrian, creating a physical shield. Of course, it took Adrian only a moment to light the plant up in blue flames, but Rose had regained her composure. For now she would ignore the staring group of first years that had amassed in the walkway, staring at the pair wide-eyed.

"_ Locamotor roots_!" she snapped, and the roots of the tree that was now just a charred stump dug up out of the ground and wrapped around Adrian's ankles, pulling him down.

"_Deprimo_!"

A sudden gust of wind swirled about Rose, seeming to slice into her from many angles with icy coldness. But she countered it quickly; "_aertemporo_!"

"_Incendio_!" the roots blew off of Adrian's legs, and he jumped up, facing her in a momentary stand still.

Hermione couldn't have chosen a worse time to speak up again. "Dueling on the grounds is against the rules!"

Rose rolled her eyes. "Shut up, you idiot girl! _Petrificus totalus_!" she snapped at Adrian.

"_Rock_ _waddiwasi_!"

"_Fiosabulo_!"

"_Levicorpus_!"

"_Graviscrus_!"

The last two hexes ricochetted off of one another, one half the blast beaming straight towards Adrian, who's reflexes saved him as he ducked, and the other towards Hermione, who was less ready to dodge. Her tiny body flew up into the air, littering her books about the courtyard as the girl screamed.

Adrian and Rose looked at each other, realizing that neither had their wands ready, and relaxed. "A draw, then," allowed Adrian. Rose laughed coldly.

"Hardly. You barely ducked that last one."

"So? I did duck. You spent the whole time just blocking. What kind of dueling is that?"

"The smart type. The best offense is a good defense!"

"Let me down!" screamed Hermione from high above them, disrupting their banter.

Adrian looked lazily to over where the first years, Gryffindor and Slytherin alike, were pointing and giggling at the girl madly. "You lot just come from flying?" he asked. Someone nodded, and he looked back to the floating girl. "Flying lessons, huh?" he commented. He flicked his wand out at her. "Looks like you need some work on that, Granger! Allow me to help!"

Hermione's mane of hair became a blur as she spun about rapidly, losing her voice to her shrieking, much to the grounded first years' delight. "Let—me—down!" she managed to scream again.

Adrian let her twirl about some more, but looked over to Rose. "So, Rose?" he said. "What do you think? Should I let her down?"

Rose held back a smile as she tried to put on her poker face. "Mr. LaConner! This is a most inappropriate use of magic! Ten points from Slytherin, and put that girl down at once!"

"As you wish, miss prefect!"

Perhaps it was inappropriate for a prefect to stand by and watch as a first-year student was dropped twenty meters through the air, but Rose was perfectly content to watch the girl fall flat on her face. However, as she was brought to reality by the sickening _thud_ of Hermione hitting the ground and the strangled sob coming from the girl, Rose quickly drew her wand and ran towards the shaking body.

Over five years of bickering and dueling with Adrian, Rose had learned a few things, the first of which she had completely ignored. The blond wizard had little regard towards the bodily condition of his opponents; so long as they did not die he did not care whether they were white as a sheet, bloody, and with an arm jutting at a harsh angle as the other pressed against ribs as Hermione was. Rose swore under her breath. "Try to stay still… _somniare._" The girl's eyes fluttered shut. "Get Professor Snape!" she snapped towards the first years angrily. "That was too much, Adrian."

"She'll be fine. You've recovered from worse, haven't you?"

"That's not the point. You've really done it this time—_tergeo."_

"Really done it? The only thing I've done was a favor—for you."

"How's that?" Rose demanded, jumping up to face the boy. "You just brutally injured a first-year on my watch! For Merlin's sake—can't you think for once?"

"You did say she was annoying you—"

"Let me through!"

Professor McGonagall burst through the mass of wide-eyed first years. Her eyes flashed as she saw Granger's pale body, but she stayed level-headed as she knelt down beside the girl. "Miss Hawthorne—what's going on here?"

Rose glared fiercely at Adrian, who just shrugged nonchalantly and shoved his wand into his cloak, crossing his arms to watch events from the side. "She fell about… twenty meters, Professor. I knocked her out so she wouldn't move anything. I think she's broken some ribs—I sent someone for Severus already—I'd fix them myself, but I can't say that would be the wisest idea."

"I would think not," snapped McGonagall. She looked up to see Severus coming through the crowd, tailed closely by Professor Dumbledore and the unlikely messenger Ron Weasley. "Oh, Severus. Please, take a look."

The two men knelt over the girl's body, and Severus' deft hands gingerly moved the awkward arm and laying it in the grass beside her. He pressed lightly against her torso, the girl moaning in response.

In the meantime, Dumbledore was standing again. Gone was the cheery face of the man who toasted at feasts as his eyes pierced into Adrian. For once the boy looked down and away, as if suddenly aware of the gravity of his actions, and he did not meet the headmaster's eyes again.

"How bad is it, Severus?" asked McGonagall as Severus trailed his wand lightly over the girl's body, muttering voicelessly in a silent spell. After a minute he grew still, then let his wand rest over her arm. "_Episky._" With a revolting _snap_ the girl's arm slid back into place, and the man sat back on his heels. "She's broken five ribs," he said quietly. "As she's already unconscious, it would be best to take her to Poppy to mend them all at once." McGonagall nodded and stood, pulling out her wand. "_Levicorpus._"

The crowd of first years parted as McGonagall floated the girl's body through, walking towards the castle. Rose stared after her silently, itching to move away from Severus but having no valid reason to. Dumbledore turned towards them when the pair was out of sight, fixing Severus with a grave look. "I'm afraid Mr. LaConner and I are long overdue for a talk. I will send him to you later." His solemn blue eyes flicked to Rose. "Good day, Miss Hawthorne."

She tripped over her words: "Good eving—evening, Professor." The same silent audience watched as the old man and the blond boy walked down the cleared path, and this time when the doors to the hall shut, the first years looked back expectantly at Rose. The girl swallowed and urged her composure to return—it was her job to conduct the younger students.

"Supper's been served already, so move along!" she said as primly as she could muster. "Mr Weaseley, ten points for being the messenger—and don't tell your brother, you hear?"

"Right!"

So while the first years cleared out of the courtyard, Rose and Severus stood silently by, the final audience. As the doors shut for the third time, the man turned to his student, a darkness in his eyes that Rose could only expect meant trouble for her.

"Rose. You have the walk to my office to get your story together, and then I would be _very _interested to hear what Granger was doing high enough in the air to leave a first-year sized dent in the green."


	11. In Which Rose Really Does Remember I

_Merlin's Beard, it's been ages, hasn't it?_

_I suppose I owe all ya'll an apology—I really did not mean to put this off so long! This chapter (or should I say more accurately this chapter which will be the eternal death of me, which is alternatively titled In Which Noa Gives in to a Character Who's Story Never Actually was Written Part I) has been slowly composed over the last few months. The **REALLY** awkward thing is—it's not even done yet. So I'm going to have to break the oath I swore to constrain Rose to a three chapter arch. She's now managed to commandeer a four chapter slot. Then again, this is what I get for allowing a OC with a fully planned story to work her way into a non-OC based story... So I suppose I doomed myself._

_In any case, I broke this chapter into two parts, as the total compiled is at around 7000 word and not finished. That'll put it at about a sixth of my total word count by the time I'm done—and trust me, I've had many an argument with a certain Miss Rose about this. So while this chapter is around 5000 words, the next should be back to around 3000, and should be up tonight or tomorrow, if I work at it._

_And I truly am sorry for the delay, but I can still make no commitment to an update schedule. As much as I love writing this, maintaining a decent GPA so my colleges do not reject me after graduation is also fairly important._

_Anyways, Happy Reading! As always, reviews are more than welcome_

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..

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_Chapter Eleven: In Which Rose Really Does Remember Everything Part I_

...

"Mum?" asked the five-year-old boy as his parents slid into their traveling cloaks. "How long—How long will we be at Gran's, Mum?"

"Oh, it won't be too terribly long, Madison. Besides, Gran has a lovely old house. I'm sure you'll spend weeks just exploring the mansion before you get bored." The woman who spoke leaned down to ruffle the hair of the curious boy. It was black and loosely curly, just like hers, but where the child's hair was baby soft and wispy hers was long and silky. "Now I'll take Rose, and you'll take your suitcase, okay?"

"'Kay."

He tried to let go of the hand of the two-year-old girl who stood sleepily beside him, but their mother had to pry the toddler's fingers away from Madison's hand. When she finally pulled the girl away, the woman laughed down at the boy. "Rose loves you very much, Madison!" she said.

The toddler burst into tears in her mother's arms.

.

..

...

Yet two years later saw the tiny girl latched onto her mother's cloak with the same ferocity she had gripped her brother's hand with. "Rose!" exclaimed the harried woman. "Really, can't I get inside the door without being set upon by leeches?"

"She rarely sees her mother; of course she would cling to you." This was the voice of an elderly lady, a retired widow of a witch who kept to herself and outside of the crossfire of politics and wars: Gran. "She hugs you all the more now to make up for all the time she's missed with you."

"That's bull shit, and you know it. Rose is only three, after all, and not exactly displaying any deep thoughts right now. Has Matt arrived?"

"Charlotte! Mind your tongue in front of your daughter! She's four, not three, and that's old enough to pick up on her mother's nasty habits. Matthew's in the kitchen with Madison. He got here nearly two days ago."

"Two days?" Rose's mother pushed the child away, limping down the hall to meet her husband.

"Rose, let your mother talk to your father for a bit, alright?" ordered Gran, halting the child in her path as she tried to chase after her mother. "She's been working quite hard to get here."

"Oh, may I please go into the kitchen with them?" piped the girl. "I will be quiet. I promise. I pinky promise!"

"Pinky promise?" repeated the elderly woman quizzically. "I dare say I do not wish to know where you picked up that term… but very well, you may go to them—but you must be quiet, you hear? And if your mother tells you to leave, you leave them be right away!"

"Yes, Gran!" said the child, but she was already halfway to the kitchen door.

In the well-lit, fire-warmed room Rose crawled up onto her father's lap, where he absent-mindedly stroked her hair. "The Order's man is coming here tonight," he said. "Someone will be coming to swear us into secrecy. If you want to back out, now's your last chance. We can still stop this, you know."

"And do what? Run off, get ourselves killed trying to leave the country?"

"Really, Char, take me seriously for a minute... You have friends that you are going against. Your whole family is—you're throwing away everything—"

"And you expect me to stand by when they killed Bolanda?" demanded the woman. "When we're wasting so much time spilling the Order's blood there's none left to deal with the real issue at hand?"

"The Order certainly won't be supporting in our ideology!"

"I don't care about that so much right now, anyways," said the woman as she finally sat at the dining table, a bowl of pumpkin soup before her. "They killed Bolanda. Nothing will be sweeter than my revenge."

"Mummy—what happened to Aunt 'Landa?" said Madison, coming through the doorway before Gran.

"Now, that is not for the children's ears, is it Charlotte?" said Gran, glaring at her daughter once again. "Let's take our soup to the dining room if your parents wish to speak of such things, Rose and Madison."

"Nonsense," said Charlotte. "They deserve to know as much as anyone. Come, Madi, sit by Mummy for a moment."

The children's father shifted Rose in his lap. "Char," he warned lightly, "They're only kids..."

"I see your two days with my mother has affected you," Charlotte snapped. The man shrugged, and she turned back to her son. "Now Madi here is a big boy, I'm sure he can handle the truth, right?"

"Yes, mum," said the seven year old, his feet dangling from his chair.

"When was the last time your Aunty Bolanda came to visit?" the woman asked, apparently satisfied.

"At my, at my... birthday, I think."

"Which you were absent from," cut in Gran.

"Don't be rude, mother. Madi knows his mummy is very busy." The woman paused, regarding her son. "Now Madi, I want you to understand completely: Your Aunty Bolanda is dead."

The boy stared back at her. "Dead?"

"Dead."

"But Aunty wasn't sick!" said Rose, making the adults sigh at the four year old. She was not even supposed to be able to understand this, at her age, let alone make reasonable contributions to discussion.

"No, Rose," said her father. "Bolanda was not sick at all."

"Why?" Madi demanded of his mother. "Why is Aunty...?"

"She was killed. Killed in cold blood by the Dark Lord."

The boy stared at her. "Killed?"

"Yes, my love, killed." She set down her spoon, seeming to have lost her appetite. "You see, Aunty Bolanda once befriended an enemy of the Dark Lord. That friend was captured and Aunt Bolanda was to—"

"Char," said Matthew softly.

She glanced at him in annoyance, but seemed to reconsider what she was saying.

"Your Aunty Bolanda helped her friend escape," she tried again. "And the Dark Lord was less than happy about that, so he sent her on a mission that she couldn't possibly succeed at. But when she came back to the Dark Lord unsuccessful he was waiting to call her traitor, and so she was executed."

"What's exe—exe—exeputid?" Rose asked, tripping over that word.

"Charlotte, this conversation has gone on long enough!" Gran snapped. "You're in my house, and _I_ say that the children need not—"

"They're not _your_ children, Mothe—"

The women's snapping was cut short by a booming knock at the front door. The kitchen fell into silence as its five inhabitants hesitated, none knowing what to do, until the knocking sounded again and Charlotte said softly, "That'll be the men from the Order, then." She glanced half-heartedly at Matthew, only to sweep out of the room.

Gran broke the silence for a moment as her daughter hurried down the hallway. "Give me Rose, Matthew; I'll take them upstairs."

But this time Matthew shook his head, a bit sadly. He picked lifted Rose off his lap and onto the chair beside him, where she sat cross-legged to prop herself up a little higher. "The kids haven't had any soup yet, have they, Florette? They look like they could use it." He met Gran's skeptical glare calmly. "Besides, Rose will never remember this, will she? And I'd rather they remember this of us, before anything too out of control happens."

Gran raised her hands up into the air in exasperation, but the sound of the door opening to the night and voices speaking hurriedly made the woman merely sigh and go to dish out the soup. The voices down the hall quieted. Then came the footsteps, carrying whoever had come calling towards the kitchen. Rose twisted around in her new seat so she could see the dark doorway.

The man who stood at it was hesitating in the shadows. Though pale, he was dressed all in black, so he seemed to blend into the shadows, and his beady black eyes darted about the fire-lit room suspiciously. "Severus!" Matthew suddenly exclaimed, starting up out of his seat. "You're the one—" His words were cut short, however, by another figure—a broad-shouldered man who stood a full head higher than the first—rounding the doorway and pushing past the pale man, boldly stepping into the kitchen and staring Matthew down. "Nicolai Vector," Matthew hissed. "I might've known they'd send you."

"Trust me," Vector growled back. "If I weren't sworn to this duty, I'd have you spirited away to Azkaban before you could blink."

Suddenly a bowl of hot soup was set with a _thud_ on the table before Rose, drawing everyone's attention to Gran. "Vector," she greeted rather calmly.

"Madam Hawthorne," said the man in minor surprise, watching the woman bring a second bowl to Madison. His voice was no longer hostile. "Always a pleasure."

"Indeed. How is your father doing?"

"He's in America, actually." The large man shrugged slightly at this. "Has connections in the Salem Witch Academy, apparently, though I can't say their hospital provides as well for him as Saint Mungo's could. But I am glad he is keeping out of the fray, aren't I?"

"Then give him regards the next time you speak to him, will you?"

"I will."

"Though I would not have you reporting my inhospitality… a bowl of soup would be nice after your travels, wouldn't it?"

"I'm afraid I'll have to decline, Madam," Vector said a bit stiffly. His gaze fell back to Matthew, who, although settled back into his seat, had not stopped his glare. "I am hoping to get on with this as quickly as possible."

Charlotte appeared, urging the slighter man, Severus, through the door. "Please, take a seat, both of you," she urged, resuming her own place at the far end from her husband, leaving the two guests the seats on the interior side of the table, facing the door. Gran silently slid into the space between Madison and Rose, watching Vector and Severus as they took the places beside Charlotte and Matthew, respectively.

Rose found the pale man staring at her, and returned the look fearlessly. He was a strange-looking creature, with his many-layered robes and greasy black hair pulled into a pony tail. His nose was a bit large, and his eyes deep-set, making it seem even larger, and at the slightest disturbance—Vector pulling a scroll from within his robes—he nearly sprang out of his seat, only to regain his composure.

The scroll that Vector had withdrawn from his robes rolled out neatly in front of him. As best Rose could see, it was completely blank, and the man seemed to disregard it in favor of talking, much to the child's disappointment. "So," he said simply, studying first Charlotte, then Matthew. "We are here today because the Order had decided that it can best make use of you by linking the three of you together." Matthew was giving Severus a questioning look, which went unanswered as the man stared pointedly at the blank scroll. "What this means," Vector continued, "Is that you will be confidants of any information necessary. To bind you to each other means that you have as little direct involvement with the Order as possible. It also means that the three of you will be able to aid each other in whatever ways you might, should a situation arise. We have many other confidant pacts within the lower levels of the Death Eaters, you can be sure."

"So we will not be bound to Dumbledore?" Charlotte demanded. "I was under the impression—"

Vector cut her off. "Dumbledore seems to think that Severus' binding to him will be more than enough to keep the pair of you in line as well," he growled. The comment drew a gasp out of Charlotte, but he carried on. "Though I have my doubts. Give me a reason, and I will carry out vengeance like you were bound to me."

The couple at the table's ends remained silent, their eyes on the pale man, which Vector seemed satisfied with. He withdrew his wand from the sleeve of his traveling cloak, and placed its tip on the blank scroll. With practiced motions he drew it across the parchment, although it was not the motion itself that had Rose straightening up. His wand left a black trail in its wake, and that blackness spread across like ink seeping into a wet page—only, peering closer Rose could see that it was twisting into some sort of scripted chain that she, at four years old, had not read. When Vector was done, he sheathed his wand again, looking up at Gran. "Will you be the witness for your family, Madam Hawthorne?"

"Let me ask this first," she said quietly. "What protection will the Order offer my grandchildren? Me? From how Charlotte described the situation to me, she'd need the mansion as a safe-house, of sorts, but I will not put my grandchildren into a situation where the Dark Lord's forces may come storming in on us at any minute!"

Vector sighed. "Of course not, Madam," he said calmly. "The Order will place every charm and enchantment it can on your home—and the choice of secret keeper will be left up to you. You-Know-Who will not find you here—if he could even determine where 'here' is."

"Then yes," said Gran, "If you can guarantee the safety of my grandchildren, then yes, I will play witness."

"Very well. And I, as representative of the Order, play witness for the Order, and in Dumbledore's stead play witness for Severus Snape." He did not need to show Gran how to press her hand into the center of the scroll—she did it like she'd done it a thousand times before. When Vector was satisfied he turned to Severus. "You first, then, Severus."

For the first time the strange man spoke. "I have already sworn myself to Dumbledore," he said in a low monotone. "Is this necessary?"

"It is."

His black eyes flashed for a moment, but again his glance darted to Rose, then Madison, and Severus nodded curtly.

"Very well, repeat after me. I, Severus Snape."

The man's sallow face grew stony. "I, Severus Snape."

"Do swear to treat these two as confidants and allies, to protect at the expense of my own safety their well-being, and will carry out the orders of the Order of the Phoenix to the best of my capabilities." The quiet man repeated it blandly, the sentence making the rings of script on the scroll ripple. "I will not betray the Order in the face of death to ensure my own safety. I will not betray my confidants."

When Severus was done, he turned to their mother―"I, Charlotte Hawthorne"―and repeated the oath. When he turned to their father, however he paused. "What name do you go by these days, anyways?"

Matthew glared at him. "I, Matthew Vaine," he said coldly, "Same as ever."

The two men tried to stare each other down for a minute, then finished the oath. "Now," said Vector, setting a seemingly ordinary quill on the ornate circle of script. "Your scrawl in the circle."

Rose craned her neck, trying to get a better look at the circle, but Gran nudged her firmly into her seat. Severus was the first to pick up the quill, and though there was no ink to fill it with, he set it to the parchment and signed it shortly. When he was done he dropped the quill and pulled back his hand, muttering something, but caught Rose staring at him again and let the excessive folds of his cloak sleeves cover his hand. Charlotte and Matthew repeated the process, but still Gran would not let Rose sit up to see better, and the couple let their robes fall over their hands just as Severus had done.

That was it. When Matthew finished signing, the rings of script seemed to ripple again, and then the blackness faded away, leaving the parchment as blank as it had been before. Nicolai quickly rolled it again and stashed it back into his cloak, and stood abruptly. "I hope I will not be seeing you again," he growled towards Matthew, but he nodded to Gran before rounding the table and hurrying out down the hall, the door slamming behind him.

At once the questions started. "You swore yourself to Dumbledore?" Matthew hissed as Charlotte demanded, "How on earth did you get yourself mixed up in this, Severus?" and Gran stood, saying, "I suppose you'd like a bowl of soup?"

Severus took the questions in order of importance. "Yes, please," he addressed Gran, who was quick to fix him with a bowl of steaming orange soup. He ignored it for a moment though as he pressed his thumb and index finger into the bridge of his nose then brushed a few stray hairs out of his face. "As for Dumbledore, well…" He trailed away, then distracted himself with his soup. Gran nudged her granddaughter as sat down.

"Eat yours, too, Rose."

Severus sighed after a few bites, tracing patterns in the thick soup's surface. "I hadn't expected it to be you, really," he said quietly. "When Vector showed up to collect me, I had considered my options. I thought perhaps… well, never mind that." He set down the spoon entirely, meeting Matthew's eyes. "Yes, I was sworn to that old fool. I am as locked into this as any, at this point."

"What did he do to trick you into that?" Charlotte demanded. "I swear the old man's as slippery as a Slytherin..."

Severus gave her a long look, his face twisting into a grimace. "It was Bolanda for you," he said dryly. Charlotte nodded emphatically.

"The Dark Lord has crossed too far over the line this time," she declared, effectively deflected. "I will not rest until my sister is avenged."

The dark man regarded her a moment longer, then turned back to Matthew. "And... your father?"

Matthew shrugged. "He was my step-father. Really, I'd follow Char if she followed Vector's—" he spat the name "—father to America. But my wife is stronger than that, you'll find."

Severus said nothing, scrutinizing the man. Then his look turned to Gran. "And what do you have to say of this? I had understood the Hawthorne line to be one of blood purity." Gran stared right back at him.

"All I ask is my grandchildren's protection," said the proud witch coolly. "From Bolanda's murder, we seem to have placed our faith in the wrong Lord to lead us. While I cannot say I approve of Dumbledore's ideas, if the Order can protect my grandchildren, then I will stand by my daughter's choice."

Black eyes flickered once more between Madison and Rose, who was staring at him again. When she realized she'd been caught, she frantically started wolfing down her soup.

"I can say that I have been ensured every possible safety for my own future," Severus said as he looked back to Gran. "And with this... binding that has been formed between us three, I would expect that that safety would be extended to you. If you do not trust Dumbledore to protect you fully, Madam Hawthorne, then I would extend an offer, in exchange for the intrusions on Hawthorne Manor that I will be carrying out in the days to come."

The woman raised an eyebrow. "And what is that?"

"Should Charlotte and Matthew ever fail—don't stop me, Charlotte, you should know what you've gotten into—should Charlotte and Matthew ever fail, I have an old house in muggle Cokeworth. The Dark Lord knows not of it, as I only recently bothered to investigate my inheritance, nor has the Order ever heard of it. It is small, and has not been kept, but is unknown and undetectable by any known means. I have secured it with every charm I know."

"That is most generous," Gran replied. "And will not go unnoted if you are in need to a favor from a house like Hawthorne."

"It is also unnecessary, isn't it?" Charlotte cut in. "You are more than welcome in Hawthorne Manor whenever necessary, I assure you, and you will always find my mother and children here. Your house will remain vacant, Severus, until you visit it yourself."

Rose slumped a bit in her seat, though none of the adults noticed it. She hated being confined to this manor all the time. Large as it was, half the doors were locked, and when Madison got bored with her she had no one to play with. When Severus had mentioned visiting his home—although it had taken the child a minute to understand that it was an invitation he had offered Gran—she had been excited by the prospect of new grounds to explore.

"So what was it, Severus?" Matthew asked. "Or should I say, who? Who did the Dark Lord kill?"

Severus hesitated. "No one, as of yet."

Charlotte shook her head. "You let Dumbledore get to you, didn't you?" she accused. "Even in school you always cared too much—Lucius and the others would always find some way to—"

"No, Charlotte," Severus cut in, even quieter than before. "It was I who approached Dumbledore, not the other way around. You see, I—"

The tolling of the grandfather clock that stood in the next room started the man out of his seat. His wand was out, and the other adults' were reaching for theirs as his chair clattered to the floor, but in the silence that followed it was Madison who had to ask, "What is it?"

"Your bedtime, that's what!" Gran declared. "Come now, Rose, you've stayed up long enough, haven't you?"

"But I want Mummy to put me to bed!" the girl piped. There was another brief silence as Gran turned to her daughter expectantly, only for the woman to wave her off sourly.

"Don't be silly," reprimanded Gran. Severus waved his seat back into its proper position. "You've bothered your parents more than enough for one evening, my dear! Now off to bed!"

Madison silently climbed down from the tall kitchen chair, and though Rose protested ardently her pleas fell on deaf ears. Matthew pulled the girl off her chair and into a quick embrace before placing her on the floor, and Gran took her hand and led her out of the kitchen and down the dark hell. Behind her she could hear her parents voices start up again, a murmuring that the girl would come to hear often when she sat at the top of the stairs late at night in months to come.

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..

...

"_Florette!"_ the desperate voice hissed through the house. "_Florette Hawthorne, your family is in danger!"_

Rose had fallen out of her bed at the sound of the echoing voice, scared that Gran had discovered her reading by lamplight in her oversized bed, and it took her a minute before she realized what the voice had said. Danger? She wondered at that, peering around the shadows for any sign of a monster lurking in the corners, but she found nothing.

Then came the knocking. It was a pattern Rose knew by heart, though it was normally soft on the door and not shaking the walls of the great manor. Rose quickly blew out the lantern, leaving it on the floor where she'd fallen, and by moonlight scampered across the old floorboards light enough so that they did not creak. The lights in the foyer flared up, casting an orange glow through the crack under Rose's door, but she tugged at the handle none the less and tiptoed to the top of the stairs just in time to see Gran, her silver hair piled atop her head and her night robes poor protection from the cold, open the front door of Hawthorne Mansion.

"Severus!" she exclaimed, but the man swept past her into the entrance, slamming the door shut with a sweeping hand gesture behind him.

"Florette, we must make for Spinner's End," he hissed. "Are you packed? Are the children awake? Florette—has anyone come here tonight?"

"What nonsense are you on about, Severus!" Gran asked hastily. "What has happened?"

"There's no time—the children—" Severus started up the stairs, only to spot Rose trying to hide behind the banister. "Rose! Get your brother!"

Yet Madison was quickly behind her. "What is it?" he called back, rubbing sleep out of his eyes, but Severus ignored him, too.

"Florette, the brooms!"

"They're in the cupboard by the back door, but-" Her protests were lost on the man as he swept past her. "To hell with it," she snapped. "Children! Go get dressed, as fast as you can!"

"What's going on, Gran?" Madison pleaded.

"Now, boy!"

Rose was already pulling her warmest sweater over her nightgown and slipping her feet into her boots, though something caught her eye in the moonlight-the book she'd been reading just before. She tucked it under her sweater before hurrying down to the landing, finding Gran already dressed for travel and once again snapping at Severus.

"Where's Charlotte, Severus?"

"There's no time, Florette, and I dare not speak it here—if they find me—" The man saw the girl approach and beckoned her over. "Rose will fly with me; you take Madison. And the appropriate charms, of course..." He drew his wand.

"And why can we not just apparate to your—Spinner's End, you said?"

"The Dark Lord has men within the ministry—they'd know if we were just apparate, and where we'd land—come here, Rose..."

When she drew closer Severus' wand darted out and struck her on the top of the head, but it was not pain that she felt but rather the slip of cool liquid from her scalp to her toes. She was not wet, no, but Rose had never felt a Disillusionment Charm's effects before, and exclaimed in minor surprise when she looked down to see her boots and skirt with a floorboard pattern over them.

"Severus—tell me where my daughter is!"

The man silently struck the still sleepy Madison as he'd struck Rose, though the boy was too tired to be as delighted as his sister by the charm's effects. He turned to Gran and tapped her a bit more delicately, but even as her face faded to match the paper on the walls behind her the determination did not fade from it.

"Charlotte and Matthew will not be joining us. For or their sake I hope it is because they are dead," the man growled. Rose didn't understand what he was saying, and was easily distracted as he spelled himself, layering his black cloak with projections of the wall of framed photos behind him. "Florette, I will explain as soon as I can, but now we must get to Spinner's end. I am known to be a friend of Charlotte and Matthew. My absence at their... my absence will not go unnoticed. Please, Florette. I promised Charlotte."

Without a word Gran grabbed Madison by the shoulder and slammed open the front door, leading the child out into the night. With a final wave of his wand Severus darkened the foyer and led Rose after her family.

Rose had never ridden on a broom before, but the man had them up in the sky so quickly she barely had time to realize they'd taken off before they were speeding towards a distant cluster of lights.

"Where are we going?" she tried to ask Severus, though her voice got lost in the wind and she had to shout it a second time for him to hear.

"My old house, in a muggle town," he said back. "It'll only be a half hour's flight!"

"Oh," said Rose. Severus' house—she wondered if it were anything like Hawthorne Manor, though remembered him describing it as small. She didn't mind small, so long as she could explore the muggle town. The book digging into her stomach gave her one other question—"Is there a library?"

"No!" He spoke straight into her ear so she could hear him. "But there are books from floor to ceiling!"

That seemed to satisfy Rose, and she stayed quiet for the remainder of the flight, though her eyes were wide as saucers as she stared down at the lights of a city on the banks of a black river far below them as they passed overhead.

Severus guided them to land in a shadowed alleyway between two series of brick row houses, Gran just behind him. "I'm too old for this!" the witch hissed as she dismounted, but Severus was already leading Rose to the main street. He peered about the corner, cautiously searching left and right before pulling the girl along down one, two—the third house on the left. It was a seemingly normal door, and Severus pulled a seemingly normal muggle key from his sleeve, turning it quickly in the lock so he could hastily pull his shivering entourage into the pitch-black hallway.

When the door clicked shut behind Gran, Rose heard Severus mutter, "Lumos!" and his wand lit the corridor with a pale silver glow. He had not exaggerated when he said there were books from floor to ceiling; they stood in tenacious piles along the walls, towering over Rose. But the man did not give her time to examine them; Madison had to push his sister down the short hall to keep up with him. They arrived inside just in time to see Severus shoot sparks into the fireplace, igniting the wood within into a crackling fire in seconds.

"Florette," he said, drawing something out of his cloak as he turned to face the woman in the doorway. He tossed it to her—a little black bag no larger than Rose's boot. "Everything you'll need is in there. I'll be back as soon as I can be. Don't leave the house until I return. I'll send a message to the Order if it becomes clear I cannot, but for now—" he pushed past her, opening the front door once again "—stay put!"


	12. In Which Rose Really Does Remember II

…_.I did say I couldn't guarantee a steady schedule, right? But at least this time I was a good deal closer to when I said I'd post. As in a matter of days, rather than months._

_Not much new to say here, only that this chapter should really be read as a finishing of the last one. The next chapter will bring us back to the present, which (from the point of view of an author who has been enslaved by Rose's demands for flashbacks for the last three months) is something to look forward to_—_and then we may even get back to the actual story! How strange!_

_Special thanks to Cyiusblack and Laurakyna as reviewers of the last chapter. I'm glad the story is enjoyable! As always, anyone with comments or criticism of any sort is more than welcome to drop a quick review; I can't improve my writing without feedback!_

_Also as always: Enjoy!_

_Chapter Twelve: In Which Rose Really Does Remember Everything Part II_

The first day passed in near silence. The children huddled in front of the fireplace, together under a large blanket Gran had pulled from the bag Severus had given her. The old witch herself was noncommential, not correcting her wards' slips of tongue or telling them which activity to perform when as she usually did. Instead she sat silently at the rickety dining table, occasionally sighing as she switched which hand was folded into the other listlessly. The children did not venture farther than a little lavatory tucked in under the cobwebbed stairs at the end of the hall.

The second day, when the children woke curled up on the floor, Gran had cooked up bacon and eggs, and after breakfast she and the children searched for kitchens in the dusty front room, but when Rose got too close to the windows Gran nearly shouted at her to come away. They spent the rest of the day much as they spent the first, only slightly more comfortable on the cushions than they had been on the floor. Gran didn't cook lunch or dinner, but brought out sandwiches from the depths of Severus's bag.

The third day Gran cleaned.

Stacks of books were pushed out into the hall to make way for bowls of soapy water to slosh across the floor and be pulled back in to Gran's wand. She did this over and over again until the floors shone, then found some old brooms tucked away in a little cupboard and told the children to sweep under the furniture and in the dark corners while she beat down cobwebs from the ceiling. The air was so full of dust Rose had a sneezing fit until Gran could clear it away with another spell, and then she had to clean the floors all over again. She gave the children rags to wash the walls, brightening considerably the pastel pink wall paper. By six o'clock the kitchen was pristine and the children exhausted, and they fell asleep on the floor again without bringing in the dusty cushions.

The fourth day Gran made the children wash away the dust from the covers of each book as they returned the stacks to their original places in the kitchen. Rose was quite slow at this, as every cover with a word she did not know—and there were many—she would nag for the definition from her brother. Gran shut herself in the lavatory, and when she came out again there was no longer slick black sludge at the drain of the shower or a scuttling sound in the walls when one came in to releive themselves.

Day five, day six—every book in the hall had its cover was washed and was moved to the kitchen, where they waited as gran attacked the hallway in the same manner she had attacked the kitchens. When she was done she worked some sort of charm on the books that arranged them by subject—or so she told Rose, who'd never heard of "Dragonlark Immunology" or "Experimental Physics". She also charmed candles to float midair, avoiding the gaslights like a curse.

Seven, nine, thirteen—it was the thirteenth day, November the seventh, when Rose woke in the dark of the kitchen to hear the murmur of voices in the front room. She left her brother on the cushions they had arranged on the kitchen and snuck into the hall on tiptoes.

"It's all over," she heard a shuddering voice say. "We had only hoped—but now it's done. Finished. Everything's over."

The girl peered around the corner. Severus, dressed as she'd always seen him in his heavy black robes, was huddled in one of the cushion-less armchairs, a mug of something ignored in his pale death grip.

"Tell me everything, Severus," Gran said at length, from another stripped seat. "From the beginning. What happened to my daughter, from beginning to end."

Severus sighed, his brow furrowed, but he did not hesitate long. "The Dark Lord, in the early days of October, seemed to be going rather... he was losing his grip on reality. He only amassed the amount of power he did through paranoia, of course, but certain conflicting informations had him on edge. He had those of us in charge of information working double, to gather twice as much information and to check everyone else's, because the Dark Lord would not trust anything—and then one day it was as though nothing had happened. He mocked us for wasting time checking each other's reports, and dismissed half the matters we had been looking into... that must have been when _Black_ first contacted him."

"Black?" interrupted Gran, repeating the name Severus had spat out. "I had thought Regulus turned on the Dark Lord?"

The man shook his head. "Not Regulus... _Sirius_," he spat.

"Sirius?" Florette stayed at him. "The younger Black—until he ran off and left them behind back in his school days, is that right?"

"The embarrassment of the Black family," said Severus shortly. "And the last person the Order expected to turn—foolishness."

"Regardless—what did Black do?"

Again Severus shook his head. "He was a deep part of the Order. Dumbledore had suspected a leak for some time, but he'd always suspected Pettigrew—but then Black went and blew him up—"

"My daughter, Severus..."

"I suspect that when Black contacted the Dark Lord, the easiest information to sell was that of the Order's spies. I was sworn to Dumbledore himself, so even if Black had somehow found out about me—but Char and Matt were only sworn to Vector. They were gone on a mission when the Dark Lord started to deal with traitors, and I did not have a chance to warn them to call off their meeting with Vector. So they were followed..."

In the moment of silence Rose grew aware of an itch on her scalp, and tried to scratch it as discreetly as possible , but she was not so careful in lowering her arm and caught her sleeve on one of the precarious stacks of books, sending it and the pile beside it crashing against the wooden floorboards. In an instant a wand was inches from her face. She followed the line of the arm that held it up to meet the cold eyes of Severus, who quickly lowered it again and stepped quickly back.

"Rose!" Gran chided as she came to the doorway. With a sweep of her wand the books picked themselves up and flew into much stabler stacks than they had been in previously. "Come now," the woman ordered, grabbing the girl by the shoulder and steering her back to the kitchen where her brother still slept soundly. "Back to sleep with you!"

"When's mummy coming?" the girl piped drowsily, climbing back onto her cushions. "When are we going home?"

"Hush now, child," the woman commanded as she tucked the girl under a heavy wool blanket. She tapped her wand on the girl's forehead, making a tingling sensation slip down her body. "Go back to sleep..."

.

..

...

The girl was dawdling on her way back to the Great Hall. Even out in this corridor the noise echoed off the castle's stone floors and walls, at a volume she was not comfortable with; she had spent the last five years alone with the quiet of books, for the most part. At her grandmother's affairs she had found dark corners to lurk in to avoid the hassle of playing the part of playing the part of the sweet orphan child hostess for the nagging adults, though in the recent months she had taken to escorting some poor soul closer to her own age range to the gardens, where she would abandon them to linger at one of the gazebos where she had kept stashes for sunny days. She would remain in her garden sanctuary for the duration of the party, and when the guests were preparing to leave she would find her victim again and make a show of thanking them for the time spent together.

(_"It was too short!"_ _she exclaimed, grasping her apparent new friend's hand together in hers. "I do hope you'll come again!")_

Yet it was her first day at Hogwarts. Her trunk, an older student had assured her, had been moved for her into her new dormitory, and she did not know where the library was. The library-she could imagine it perfectly, from all the questions she had barraged her brother with in her letters over the course of his first two years, but she had never thought to ask him of its location. So she had had no escape, kept sitting among her new Slytherin housemates, playing her new role of perfect societal mannerisms that her grandmother had drilled into her, but she was unaccustomed to such extended affairs. When the third round of food arrived she had excused herself with the ready excuse of searching for the lavatory, although the route she was taking to return was as winding as possible.

Away from the crowds packed into the Great Hall, she found that she rather liked Hogwarts. Where there were windows she found views of the castle's many courtyards, unlit on this night but surely a sight to see when the sun was out. She found benches—niches, really, built into the masonry in odd places. One bench was behind a stone lantern pillar, so even though it was so tucked away it was well lit. Many of the windows had ledges large enough to sit on. And the number of rooms—she had not dared open the countless doors; she would save that for later, when she would have a better idea of which doors were for classrooms and which were not. Yet there were so _many_ of them! Her young imagination was flying over the possibilities of what could be tucked away within. She longed to explore them all, but it would have to be done at a time when everyone was gathered elsewhere as they were then—her brother always gushed about how celebrated Halloween was, and by then she would know her way around the castle well enough to explore efficiently…

It should perhaps be observed that the girl was so rapt by her imaginings and plannings she lost track of time. The tolling of the bells from outside brought her back to earth with harsh abruptness, and she turned on heel to take the turn she had last skipped in _avoidance _of the return to the Great Hall she now realized she had put off far too long. Upon rounding the corner, however, she came across something she did not expect—a boy, perched in one of the window seats, just as lost in his own thoughts as she had been.

He turned at her footsteps and saw her just as she saw him, bringing them into eye contact. The girl, having been caught off guard, just stared for a moment, but quickly remembered herself and broke away from the gaze. The strange boy was only about her brother's age, and from the looks of his robes a fellow Slytherin, so she was not timid. "Excuse me," she said in her most polite tone. "Would you be so kind as to point me towards the Great Hall? I seem to have lost my way."

When he did not reply but to hop down from his perch and approach her, the girl did find herself a bit puzzled by his behavior, but then a smile crossed the boy's face. "You're a first year, then?" he asked. "I'm in third, myself, and I guess as your upper classman it's my duty to help out young ones, isn't it?"

"Well, I don't know about that," said the girl a bit quietly. Now she was nervous, but only because although he smiled and spoke with a certain charm, this boy _was_ a Slytherin, and a look like that could not possibly be a good one.

"Oh, no need to be shy," he said, flashing another wolfish smile. "But—I can see you're a clever girl, aren't you? So maybe you can help me work out a little problem of mine. What do you say?"

Though the girl longed to step back, she held her ground and put on her best undaunted façade. "And what problem is that?"

The boy smiled in a dramatic fashion. "You see, my cousin bought me a new spell book at the beginning of summer, and of course as any good student would I read it through three times over break, but I haven't had a chance to test out my new spells yet, have I?"

"Well," the girl said as politely as she could. "I'm afraid I am not so sure I could help you, as I haven't had any classes or used any magic, myself. Besides, wouldn't an upperclassman be more useful?"

The boy laughed softly, but he was drawing his wand and taking a few steps back from her none the less. "No need to worry love," he assured the wide-eyed girl. "All you're to do is to stay right there and I—well, you'll see. Ready?"

"Now really, I—"

"Levi Corpus!" the boy cried with a swish of his wand, and the girl's world was turned upside-down. Perhaps screaming was a natural first response to finding herself in the air of a sudden, but it was not what one would expect—especially considering that as she had just mentioned, the girl had yet to begin her magic lessons—when the girl reflexively whipped out her own wand from her cloak and screamed "Infringo!" at her assailant.

She crashed to the floor as he flew back down the hall, landing a good twenty meters from where he had stood. The girl was vaguely aware of a throb from her wand arm, but the wind had been knocked out of her and so she really was not thinking much at all. If she had been, she would have comprehended the boy with the broken nose as he glowered over her, pointed his wand, and hissed out some spell. Still, her dulled mind saved her a world of pain as her vision blurred into darkness.

.

..

...

A voice murmured what could have been a melodic line in low undertones from somewhere far above her. She heard that first, before she felt the ache throughout her body, before she tried to peel open her eyes to the blinding lights. When the voice ceased she had grown present again, and she tried to move—tried, as she was facing difficult getting a response out of her limbs.

"If ending up in a bloody mess on the floor your first night is supposed to be a sign of your plans for the rest of the year, I would suggest you request a transfer to a different house immediately."

The girl's green eyes quickly flashed open, regardless of her in-adjustment to the light-and she quickly found the black eyes peering back down at her. "Severus Snape?" she squeaked hoarsely.

The man raised an eyebrow. "Professor Severus Snape, indeed," he corrected.

Ignoring the wave of dizzy nausea that swept over her, the girl pushed herself up. "No, Severus—I mean I—well—you see I—" she shook, flustered as her throbbing head tried to piece together what she was supposed to be saying. "WHat I mean to say is—I'm Rose."

The other eyebrow rose to join the first.

Rose sighed. This was not going as she had originally planned, and in her dizzy spell she did not entirely trust in her ability to ad lib, but there was nothing for it now. "I mean to say—I'm Rose Hawthorne. I've been wanting to apologize for your books."

The man's expression was kept carefully unchanged as his voice remained monotone in repeating the word—"books?"

"Yes, I—" she paused a moment to regain her focus on his eyes—"I mean, when I understood about my parents I did not know what to—how to deal with myself and the books—I loved the books so much—I seem to have had a spell of trying to take out everything out on them and it was most inappropriate, and I truly am sorry. I do hope the books were not harmed too badly—we left so quickly, and..."

The dark professor continued to stare at her for a moment, then one corner of his match twitched into a slight smile. "Although you left the attic quite a mess—and it was a wonder Florette did not find that—I assure you that it was nothing a spell or two on each will not fix."

"That's a relief, then," said Rose, trying to push herself up to her feet. A firm hand pushed her back down, and she saw the smile fall right back off the professor's face.

"Give your body time to recover. I just siphoned a quarter of your blood off the floor and back into it."

Rose had to take a moment to register what the man had just said before she looked at her belly and gasped at the nasty sight. "My sweater!" she exclaimed. "Oh, Gran will be furious with me, won't she? A day in and I've already ruined a sweater!"

The professor stared at her incredulously. "A true Hawthorne, like Florette, I see," he said dryly, but then he frowned and drew his wand across the tear in the girl's sweater, where the threads seemed to grow eager to weave themselves back together and the dark stain faded back into the grey wool.

The man tucked his wand away as the girl stared incredulously as her belly, yet then she seemed to remember herself and gave him another too-bright smile. "That trick alone may make me study twice as hard for charms class," she said candidly.

Severus seemed to be resisting the urge to roll his eyes, but his monotone voice moved on to a new matter. "So tell me, miss Hawthorne, what prompted you to break an older student's nose? Sheer stupidity?"

"I broke his nose!" Rose exclaimed with minor horror, but as the professor nodded slight satisfaction was unmissable in her changing tone. "Well, it serves him right! Tossing a girl up in the air like that." Severus's expression asked enough—she quickly explained. "I was on my way back to the Great Hall when I ran into him and, so as to be polite and not say nothing I thought to ask him for directions. But then he asked me to help him with some magic and used some spell to make me fly up in the air." She scowled mightily.

"So you broke his nose?"

The girl blinked. "Well, I must have. I tried the first spell that came to mind—something I picked up from my reading of _A Standard Book of Spells_, I believe—but it went a bit wrong and he went flying himself, so he dropped me and I fell and hit my head. Frankly, everything's a bit of a blur after that."

"Ah." The professor sighed, the furrow in his brow growing a bit deeper. "Now I should warn you, Miss Hawthorne, that a standard indicator of a Slytherin is a natural talent for self-preservation. How you managed to get sorted into my house, thus, is a mystery, if your survival instinct is dull enough to allow you to try and hex the one student who would have no qualms about openly making your life a living hell. I only came looking for a problem when Adrian returned to the feast with a bloodied nose. If her had not come back, or had I not noticed, the damage to your body could have been severe. And while he is certainly the most carefree about his aggressive behavior, Adrian is certainly not the only dangerous student at Hogwarts. If you do not look after yourself, Miss Hawthorne, you will leave this school within the year, on a one-way trip to Saint Mungo's. I owe it to your parents to—"

"You say his name is Adrian?" Rose cut in abruptly, halting Severus's speech.

"Yes, Adrian LaConner. A third year."

"I should think he would make a good ally, for someone like me," the girl mused, earning another peculiar look from the professor. "Although I suppose at this rate that would be impossible."

Severus continued to stare at her for a minute longer, then stood abruptly and offered the girl a hand up. "The feast will be ending soon," he said blankly. "You should be using this time to make _allies_ with the other first years, not making enemies of the upperclassmen. I'll show you the way back."

The way Severus led was certainly faster than the route Rose had intended to take, and it led to a small door quite close to the first-year end of the Slytherin table. She hurried back to her seat, giving a laughing excuse that she had gotten lost on her way back. Looking down the table she found the blond third year glaring at her with such intensity she couldn't help but to giggle, and to complete the gesture, she waved cheerfully. When a moment later the headmaster rose to address the students again, her eyes fell instead on Severus, who raised an eyebrow to her but quickly looked away.

"A spectacular feast, as usual, to start off a new year at Hogwarts!" the headmaster's aged voice boomed over the hall. "I can only hope that you have all been happily reunited with your old friends and met a few new ones! But before we send you off to your dormitories to share the latest gossip—the school song! Everyone pick your favorite tune..."


	13. In Which Rose Fights, Eats, and Worries

_A/N : well, in the last few months, I have been, as usual, incredibly busy. I had IB testing—if you don't know what that is, consider yourself blessed—and graduation from high school, along with all the tedious events that go along with that. I have also started work on a sci-fi/fantasy story of rather epic proportions. I also have rekindled the flame of hatred I have for "the Rose arc." So forgive me for my tardiness. I will, of course, try to be a bit quicker with the next chapter, but nothing is ever guaranteed. If I am not on top of my game in the next few weeks, it will be a very, very long wait (again) as I will be leaving for a three week exchange to Japan, then getting ready for Uni._

_In any case, now that you know my life's story, here's the final bit of the Rose arc—and may we avoid following her for quite some time! As always, enjoy!_

Chapter 13 – In Which Rose Fights, Eats, and Worries

The door to Severus' office closed quietly behind the professor as Rose took her customary seat. "Now," the man said monotonously. "Explain."

Rose held the silence for a minute. In truth she had not thought much of what she would say to the man, having spent the whole walk dwelling on ways she could possibly get revenge on Adrian for this whole mess―assuming he came back from the headmasters' in one piece―and taking points from a pair of Gryffindors who apparently thought that behind a suit of armor was a private enough place to attempt to eat each other's faces. "The first years from flying were passing through the courtyard where Adrian and I were, ah, practicing," she said at last, "and one of Adrian's spells ricocheted into her."

"I have difficulty believing that," the man said coldly, making Rose roll her eyes.

"Oh, come now, Severus―she went flying. How could that be a spell not meant for me?"

"What sort of pathetic explaination is that?" he demanded. The girl flinched. "You involved a first year in your little games—and you're supposed to be the _responsible_ prefect."

"She got in the way!" Rose retorted. "It's not _my_ fault that the brat couldn't understand to stay back, is it?"

"You continue to miss the point. This behavior..."

"You expect better from me, is that it?" Rose demanded. "Then why didn't you stop Adrian from chasing after me yourself, in the Great Hall? You knew he'd be wanting to blow off some steam. You knew we'd have a little fun."

"Even if _Adrian_ wanted to 'blow off some steam', as you put it—you have always been the one who is supposed to stop him. It's the responsibility you took by declaring yourself his friend, by accepting the role of _prefect_!"

"My responsibility?" Rose laughed a bit. "Oh, it's _my_ responsibility to keep a wizard both two years older than me and borderline psychotic under control, is it? I'm sure the Board of Education would just be _thrilled_ to hear one of its fine educators declaring that."

"Even if you are going to deny that you have taken that responsibility onto yourself," Severus growled, "You _cannot_ deny your role as an upperclassman and prefect to the first years. You are supposed to keep things like this from happening, _not_ be the cause of them."

"I'm supposed to look after _my_ first years. I'm supposed to look after the _Slytherins_," she corrected. "Granger is _not_ someone that I am supposed to be protecting, any more than I am supposed to be protecting—oh, the Weasley twins!"

Severus sighed. "You are _still_ missing the point!"

"What point, Severus?" she demanded. "I told you what happened and you continue to blather on about my responsibilities. I think it is you who is missing the point!"

"What _is_ the role of prefect to you? With this attitude you've suddenly developed maybe I should I have the role revoked."

"Oh, because _I'm_ the problem when Dumbledore's gone and made _Adrian LaConner_ head boy."

"Yes, you are, because what Adrian does and does not do in relation to his role does not concern what you are to carry out yours. _Your_ role is to look after the rest of the student body, both in enforcing the rules, which you seem to have had no trouble with on the way here, and preventing injury to any student. Including Miss Granger."

"She's just a stupid mudblood!"

That was it; she was in for it now. Despite the haze of Rose's anger, she almost found herself worried that she had just jumped over the line of Hogwarts' most intimidating teacher. And she'd made it personal. But she was angry enough at this point she almost didn't care.

Severus had frozen. He looked up slowly, meeting her eyes with a shocked disgust. Suddenly he straightened up, and with a wave of his hand Rose fell back into the rickety desk chair. "Rose Hawthorne," came his hiss of a voice. It was like a blast of icy wind on a hot day. She'd rarely heard Severus shout, and his quiet voice was probably much more frightening, but now his words carried with them a sort of tension, a quaver that suggested he was fighting to keep it controlled. "Your parents died trying to suppress pure-blood supremacy thinking, turning against the dark lord, sacrificing their lives―"

"I don't care what my parents did!" Rose snapped. "They wound up dead, and a fat lot of good that does their supposed cause."

"You dare speak of―"

"I'm not their child, Severus," Rose cut in. The chair clattered behind her as she stood again, not liking the way the professor was glaring down at her and he leaned across the desk. The man raised an eyebrow, not pulling back. "I'm grandmother's granddaughter, and my brother's sister, and Adrian's friend," she continued, taking grim satisfaction in that he was finally listening. "It wasn't my parents that raised me. It was the books in your library, it was my curiosity trying to understand why my parents died. It was coming to Hogwarts and Slytherin. It was learning to trust Adrian and you. My parents didn't raise me. Even when they were alive they were too busy risking their lives, as you put it, to waste time with their children."

For a moment Severus looked like he was going to slap her, but instead he lowered his voice further. "You defend yourself with selfish, ignorant words―"

"So what? I'm supposed to be selfish. I'm still a child."

He sneered. "And you make it readily clear."

"Don't act so superior, Severus," said Rose. "You were a Death Eater yourself. I remember back when the old man brought you to the mansion and―"

"You remember that?"

His glare had lightened a bit to let his curiosity peek through. The interlude from his anger caught Rose off guard, and it took her a moment to shut her gaping mouth and collect herself. "Of course I do," she said coldly. "I've told you before: I remember everything. For better or worse."

"You were only―a toddler."

"I was four the first time you came—after Aunty Landa refused to kill her muggle friend," she snapped, "And five the year my parents got themselves killed."

Severus sighed, trying to return to the point at hand. "What hatred do you have for Miss Granger?"

"Ha, hatred? What about her is worth my hatred?" Rose demanded. "She's an arrogant girl without any natural talent who doesn't know when to shut up and admit she's wrong!"

The professor could have laughed, instead he straightened up, crossing his arms and fixing her with his smuggest glare. "Well, look who's talking."

Rose snorted, but sat back down. "Look," she growled, "at least I'm not trying to argue that my distaste for that brat is anything short of unprofessional. But why that should matter at all mystifies me―especially when addressing you, of all people. From what I hear from our first years, you make no secret of your antagonism of her, or Longbottom, or even Potter, for that matter."

Severus stiffened―there was no way to refute that argument. "But I," he contended lowly, "Would never call Miss Granger that, would I?"

Rose held her ground. "So says the former Death Eater."

For a long while Severus stared at her, sinking back into his swivel chair. Still Rose did not sit. She stared him down as he sat lost in thought, and she knew she was trying to push him towards a road of thought he didn't want to travel. "I'm beginning to think," he said after a long while, "that you may have spent too much time at Spinner's end."

Rose shrugged. "I will not deny that." He gave her a sharp look, but she kept her face cool. "The muggle children on your street, the books in your attic, the abrupt move to the new Hawthorne Mansion after living in your house for four years—perhaps I would have been better off staying with the mansion as it burned to the ground."

The lines on Severus' deepened as his jaw set. "Rose." Now his voice was soft. "What kind of thinking is that?"

Rose shrugged. "If you want the child you met at the old Hawthorne Mansion—and I'm sure _she_ would have at least slowed Granger's fall—go back in time and give her back her parents. Maybe they could have taught her not to use bad language to state simple facts. Maybe they could have taught her to stay away from psychopaths. Maybe they could have—"

"Who are you calling a psychopath?"

Spinning around in her chair, Rose was relieved to find Adrian in one piece—although he had a scowl stamped into his features. "You, Adrian," she snapped. "What on earth has you looking so grouchy? You are still here, so I assume you've not been expelled."

Shrugging, Adrian practically flung himself into his seat, and Rose twisted back around so she could see both him and Severus. "No, he confirmed, "I was not expelled."

Rose waited for more, but Adrian was suddenly very fascinated by a jar of pickling cow eyes resting on the professor's desk. Severus cleared his throat and vanished the jar with a wave of his wand, asking, "Would it be better if I call in Professor Dumbledore to get the explanation from him?"

Adrian shrugged. "I'm sure the old flobberworm will be telling the staff sooner or later."

"Adrian!" Rose snapped. "Just tell us right now, or I'll…"

The blond boy turned his cool gaze to her. "You'll what, Rose?"

With a roll of her eyes, Rose sighed. "I'll mail Bill Weasley about…"

Severus broke in. "Are you two first year Gryffindors?" he demanded. "Adrian. Explain what happened."

"Dumbledore took my wand away," the boy grumbled out finally. "For use in class only, if the teacher deems it necessary."

"How are you going to be able to study?" asked Rose.

"Apparently I am far enough ahead that only class time should be enough for me, and any other homework or practice must be done in the presence of a staff member." Adrian looked pointedly at Severus.

"Then it will have to be a staff member with an abundance of time on their hands," the man said, calmly ignoring Adrian's implications. "Anything else?"

"Well, he lectured my on and on about things from his childhood—and don't ask me for any of them, I think he put something in the tea to make me forget—"

"You took _tea_ together?" Rose nearly shrieked the question. "And here I was thinking you were being _punished_!"

"While tea with the headmaster can certainly be a torture," said Severus dryly, sitting back in his chair once more, "I find this punishment to be excessively light."

"Light?" said Arian, his voice biting with incredulity. "I don't have a _wand_, Severus, until the holidays at Christmas! And you know too well how bloody useless I am with wandless casting—I'll just have to bribe Flitwick or something—"

"You will not." Rose and Severus said in a commanding unison. They glanced at each other, faces twisting slightly to avoid showing any readable expressions, but the professor continued, "I, for one, am _fully_ prepared to have you removed from my class if I hear of any such nonsense. Rose, I expect you to keep an eye on him—a proper eye—to make sure he doesn't try anything. And whether the headmaster specified it or not, Adrian, you will _not_ be borrowing any other students' wands."

Adrian's scowl deepened. "Severus, this is completely ridi—"

"Think of it as my little addendum to your punishment," finished Severus with a brief but cruel little smile. "Rose, as I apparently had not made it clear to you in the past—you are entitled to use any methods possible to prevent him from any further idiocy. And yes, consider this as part of your responsibilities as a prefect."

"Speaking of which," said Rose, "are you still Head Boy, Adrian?"

The seventh year shrugged. "I could care less. I have no idea why the old pisspot forced that title on to me in the first place. It's not like I have time for it, even if I were interested…"

"You shouldn't call people pisspots, Adrian," scolded Rose, earning her another sharp look from Severus. "But I am interested as well. I don't think I've ever once seen you do anything remotely related to your Head Boy duties—and you always drug me to the prefect compartment on the train and wouldn't participate…"

"Addendum part two," said Severus. Now he was smirking without even trying to hide it. "You must make a reasonable contribution to the prefects' work. Of course, this is your last chance. Failure to succeed means I will be forced to promote Percy Weasley to Head Boy a bit early—and we wouldn't want that, would we?"

Adrian glared at him. "No more addendums. This mess is bad enough as it is!"

Severus raised his eyebrows again, and the smirk did not disappear, making the man's expression most peculiar. "Then you should have known better than to break a girl's arm and ribs in front of all her fellow Gryffindor and Slytherin first-years."

"Speaking of which, Severus," broke in Rose. "Another curiosity—why on earth did the headmaster put Gryffindor and Slytherin together for something like flying? It seems utterly barbaric—a gladiator style battle waiting to happen."

The smirk faded somewhat. "Do you even know what a gladiator is?"

"Of course I do! Remember everything. Read everything I could get my hands on. Do I really need to spell it out for you?"

Severus sighed. "The Headmaster has been known to be a very… sentimental man. It is possible that somehow he believes that through flying, _the deep rift between Slytherin and Gryffindor will become a bit shallower._" His voice rose as he said that last bit, and Rose and Adrian found themselves stifling laughter at his poor impression of Dumbledore, not to mention the ridiculous idea expressed. Severus' smirk returned. "Of course, the headmaster has very little to do with the actual arrangement of scheduling, he merely approves them, so the likelihood that it was actually _he_ who put together Slytherin and Gryffindor is, well… it may also be of note that Madame Hooch and Professor Dumbledore had a bit of a disagreement over this year's funding for flying and quiddich. And it was _very much_ the Headmaster who insisted that flying lessons be started as early as possible."

Adrian suddenly stood up, forcing the sullen look back on to his face. "I don't know why I bothered to come down here," he grumbled. "I did not want to hear more about the old fogey."

Rose sighed and stood as well. She repeated the habitual action of dusting off her skirt. "Then we had best be off. I expect the kitchens have already been closed, but perhaps we can still drop by? _Someone_ had to go dancing around in my supper…" The pair turned, starting to exit, when Severus stood.

"Rose," he said sternly. He did not use a quiet or angry voice, but the effect was still there. The girl turned back. "You have not just gotten away with this. I will decide your punishment soon enough."

Her shoulders sagged a bit, but she nodded. "Good evening, Professor."

Outside of the office, she and Adrian turned to walk towards the kitchens. "Punishment?" Adrian demanded. "What's he doing punishing you?"

"Well, the spells ricocheted, didn't they?" Rose said quickly. "So we don't really know which spell hit her. Besides, we aren't supposed to duel out on the school grounds like that—you know that, I know that, and Severus knows that I know that."

Adrian was quiet for a minute as they passed a group of third years—who gave the pair a wide berth; apparently the news about Hermione had already spread. "It was my spell," he said at last, the anger still in his voice, making it a bit higher than usual. "I was the one to cast _levi corpus_. And it wasn't so accidental. That Gryffindor brat was annoying as—who was she, anyways?"

"Hermione Granger," Rose grumbled.

"I know _that_; why do you think I hexed her? You were complaining about her before dinner." They had come to a large painting of a bowl of fruit, and Adrian reached up to tickle the pears while he spoke. It swung open, and the pair stepped through the hole revealed behind it. "I meant, what is her deal?'

"Miss Hawthorne, Master LaConner," a young house-elf greeted them squeakily. "What can Moppy bring for you?"

"I'd like some pumpkin soup," said Rose, stepping past the elf towards a low wooden table hidden in the shadows across the room. Elves scampered away from it, moving dishes and tossing a tablecloth over it so quickly there was no indication that it had been used for their dinner table just moments before. "And I'm sure Adrian would be happy with the same."

"Of course, Moppy would be happy to bring the Miss and Master some pumpkin soup! Just—Moppy will be quick!"

The witch and wizard sat at the hastily prepared table, ignoring completely the lingering droves of elves that had vacated it. "Granger," said Rose when they were settled, "Is this year's resident first-year would-be Percy Weasley, a know-it-all brat who believes in reading books as large as she can find in the library, regardless of content or whether her little brain can actually make sense of what is going on in them, and a muggle-born irritation to our own house's first years."

"So she adheres to the rules like Madam Marce's Sticking Powder to paper?" clarified Adrian. "That's what you mean by resident Percy Weasley, no? And why would that bother _you_?"

Rose rolled her eyes. "Oh please, Adrian, even I know the limits of the validity of rules," she said. "There is such thing as grey area and times when rules must be bent. _She_ has yet to understand this—every time I pass her in the halls she is lecturing someone about this addendum to that rule and quoting word for word from one of the first-year textbooks exactly what one of the other students should have been doing in their last class—it irritates _me_, and _I_ only run into her every now and then. You should hear the way the first years go on about her in the common room…"

"Sounds like she's the year's heartthrob."

Again, Rose rolled her eyes—she was not sure how much more sarcasm they could handle before they rolled right out of her head—but she then fixed Adrian with a suspicious glare. "Why do you want to know, anyways?" she asked. "You've been asking more and more about _people_ this year—it's not normal for you."

"Well, if I'm going to do some of those Head Boy duties, I might as well know who to be seeking out to give detentions to…"

"Liar. I said 'this year', not 'this evening'."

Moppy returned with two bowls of steaming pumpkin soup, which she, bowing, set before them. Two other elves brought spoons and napkins, and still another two goblets of cider. Again they bowed before leaving, but the Slytherin pair paid them no mind.

"Curiosity, I suppose," Adrian amended. "Why do you know so much about everyone?"

"Because one of us has to do the job, unless we want Percy Weasley running the school, yes?"

"He's only a fifth year like you. Severus wouldn't _really_ make him Head Boy this year."

"Yes, well, he would just have a hissy-fit over the fact that a fifth year was allowed a seventh year position. His ego would burst with pride or shame over the anomaly of a rule being bent like that… come to think of it, he and Granger would make a horrid pair, wouldn't they?"

"Like that'd ever happen. Weasley wouldn't want to have any rumors about him and a first year—I'll have to remember that, if he gets too annoying… Can't just wipe his memory of his last class anymore…"

"Indeed."

Rose and Adrian turned their attention to their soup, then, as it had stopped steaming and it really was getting late. Their conversation all but died, even on the walk back to the common room. They returned to their usual seats, where Rose's book bag had been abandoned before dinner, and they watched as the other Slytherins came in from enjoying their Friday evenings out of the dungeons. They were all chatting excitedly, but when passing Adrian they abruptly quieted and stepped a bit quicker.

"Adrian," Rose asked when most of the students had moved up to their dormitories or taken seats in the many leather sofas in the common room. "What have you been up to this year? Don't say studying—I know you haven't been. You mentioned it yourself—Potter' and Zabini's little group has taken over our old practice room."

Adrian ran his fingers on the ebony arm of his chair thoughtfully. "Oh, this and that, really," he said. "When you're a seventh year, you'll be this busy, too."

"Don't give me that, Adrian. It's a simple enough question."

"Really. I've been working on all sorts of things. NEWT classes really are a pain, Rose, and besides that I'm still working out what I will be doing next year…"

"Weren't you corresponding with your cousin?"

"My cousin's an ass. I've actually been writing Violet Parkinson, see if I might spend a bit of time in France..."

"You and Vi have _never_ gotten along."

"Well, she knows some people—and it seems as though putting a channel between us for the past few years has somewhat mended our relationship."

"I'll be glad to be on this side of that channel next year, won't I? Putting the pair of you together... oh, but you had better be nice to her sister, if you really mean to go to France. She told me she's going to visit Vi over the holidays—"

"What reason could there possibly be to talk to Pansy Parkinson, Rose? Compared to Violet, she's so very dull…"

"And by that you mean she's not insane."

"Yes, well… she's fallen in with the Malfoy brat, hasn't she? Violet may be a bitch by herself, but she at least chooses good company—"

"By which you mean she manages to find people more insane then herself."

"—and yes, I really do intend to go to France."

Rose blinked, pulling her eyes away from the couple that looked suspiciously like they were about to break common room rules to stare at Adrian. "What could you possibly want to do in France?"

"Aside from enjoying the fruits of travel?" he asked, laughing. "Like I said, Violet chooses her company well. There may be some job opportunities—but really, Rose, nothing is certain yet."

Rose frowned. "When did this idea of yours get planted in that shrunken brain of yours? You've never mentioned France before. And I didn't know you were on speaking terms with Vi again—let alone invite yourself into her life in France terms."

"Who said I was inviting myself?"

"Didn't you?"

He shrugged and stood up abruptly. "In any case, I've better head off to sleep now, as I've got a floo meeting with my grandmother tomorrow morning to explain all this…" Rose pursed her lips, recognizing a bad excuse to escape the conversation, but said nothing. The Head Boy jerked his head across the room. "Does it count as doing my Head Boy duties if I point out work for my prefects? Everett and Mannis are really going at it…"

Rose's gaze snapped back to the couple that appeared to be eating each other's faces, and by the time she had spelled them apart, assigned separate detentions, and returned to her seat Adrian was gone. He was hiding something, and she knew it—how else would things have gotten so out of control earlier? Adrian had never been anything short of extremely careful in making sure there was no reasonable proof that he'd been associated with the victims of his aggressive nature—a thought that had always made Rose uncomfortable, especially when he started using her in his excuses—but the Granger incident had been in front of two houses of first years. They had little time to talk, with Rose officially taking on prefect duties and Adrian—doing whatever it was that he was up to…

She sighed. It was not her night to patrol—and maybe Adrian had the right idea about going to bed early.


	14. In Which Harry Cannot Understand

_Extremely long authors note at the end of this chapter, so I'll just say, please enjoy! (and review?)_

Chapter Fourteen: In Which Harry Cannot Understand

Hermione was back in classes early the week following her accident, much to Harry', Blaise', and the rest of the first years' disappointment. Though the boys had not personally witnessed the event, having been in McGonagall's office writing ten times each the transfiguration textbook's ten rules against the improper use of magic, they had a newfound admiration for Adrian, the reason for Hermione's suffering.

"She was being her usual know-it-all self," Tracey retold more than once. "Telling Rose and Adrian how against the rules it was to duel on school grounds and the like. And the fight itself was amazing; you should have—"

"_Granger_, Tracey," Daniel would have to cut in.

"Fine, fine—so Granger gets in the way of a bounced spell and goes flying into the air—and Adrian takes control of her and flies her around and then drops her and _bam!_ She's half-buried in the courtyard."

Though annoyed to no end that they had missed this happening, by the end of the week the story had been told so many times that the boys knew more details, both factitious and fallacious, than those who had actually been there.

Hermione had taken to lecturing anyone who would listen—mainly her puppy-like follower Neville Longbottom—about _why_ exactly dueling was banned on school grounds. "Did you know," she said matter-of-factly in Transfiguration one Thursday, when someone had made her ears turn red with a grossly distorted version of the story in which she had been trying to seduce Adrian when he attacked her, "That the headmaster himself served detention for dueling on the grounds? It says so in _Hogwarts, a History_. After that he joined the dueling club, where dueling can be _safely_ practiced."

"That's not exactly a scare story, Granger," said Blaise, to the hearty agreement of the Slytherins (and the snickering of the Gryffindors).

"Quiet," said McGonagall, sweeping into the room with such a Snape-like impression even the Slytherins fell silent. "Now, before we begin," she said, reaching her desk. She turned with narrowed eyes to look over the students, so that no one dared even glance away, "As you are well aware, it is Halloween, meaning this evening is the feast. Whereas the Great Hall normally opens at four thirty for supper, tonight's feast will not begin until seven thirty. Likewise, first period tomorrow has been cancelled—but Professor Snape has assured me that your test has not been, and that your homework should already be done and thus will be collected as usual. No questions? Good. Open to page eighty two…"

Amid the groans of the rest of the class, Harry, Blaise, Daniel, and Tracey were unaffected by Snape's memo. The room Snape had instructed them to practice in was another extra potions lab, so they had had everything they had needed to practice the potion they were being tested on. The had made it four times, once using each of the students' ingredients, and by the fourth try even Tracey was feeling confident she would pass. While the potions had brewed, they had even had time to do their usual potions homework, too, so they did not share the other students procrastination worries.

Harry found he was liking being ahead in his classes. With the four first years working together, there was always one of them who could figure out why the potion was not working or whether it was Orgerthrop the Fifth or Svrdenblag the Second who led the goblins to victory in the 1432 battle against the water sprites of the southern British Channel. Even Tracey had proven her worth as a study partner, as she enjoyed such trivial History of Magic details—most likely because she was the only one of them who could stay awake through Professor Binns' weekly lectures.

"It's because we've just had lunch," she explained. "I've too much energy to sleep through History! Besides, it was obviously Orgerthrop the _Sixth_—Orgerthrop the Fifth died in 1383—"

Whatever the reason, even with Blaise' and Daniel's antagonistic relationship the quartet stuck together, and their efforts were beginning to show.

"Well done, Potter," said McGonagall as she passed out graded quizzes at the end of class. "I'm beginning to think you'll have your father's aptitude for Transfiguration!"

Harrie looked at the page, finding only two red marks and the grade—eighteen out of twenty. He knew Daniel had gotten another twenty, but McGonagall had not praised her, or Blaise, whose page was marked nineteen. Silently Harry shoved the parchment into his book bag and followed his friends out of the class.

"Well what do you know, Harry," Blaise said sarcastically as they joined the masses heading to lunch. "You've become an honorary Gryffindor!"

"Oh, put a sock in it," Harry grumbled. "What was it the Carrow twins were saying about the Slytherin Halloween party?"

"How it's the best party of the year and this year they've gotten three extra house elves, thanks to the Malfoys?" Tracey suggested.

"Yeah, that," said Harry. "What _is_ a house elf, anyways?"

"Don't change the subject!" Blaise laughed, throwing an arm over Harry's shoulder as if he could physically stop the topic from getting away from him. "I think it's high time we put your fame to good use! To—I don't know, get me out of flying?"

Harry was skeptical. "How do you expect that to happen?"

"_Oh Professor! I'm the Boy Who Lived! My parents saved the wizarding world! But because I was orphaned and so, so lonely all by myself in that big, bad muggle place, where I was practically treated like a house elf, I get so lonely without my friends around. Won't you please, please let Blaise stay with me during flying lessons? I'd be safer with someone else around, and so much less alone…"_

"Why did you make my voice so high?" Harry asked between laughs. "And really, what is a house elf?"

"More importantly, which Professor is that supposed to work on?" Tracey asked, at which point Daniel slyly suggested Snape, sending the Slytherins into a whole new round of laughter.

As they made to enter the Great Hall, they were stopped by a Ravenclaw who looked to be in his seventh year. At the sight of him, Blaise released Harry and moved ahead of the group.

"Hello, Blaise," the boy said pleasantly. "Mum sent an owl."

Harry studied the pair carefully as and folded piece of parchment was handed over. Though the older boy's skin was perhaps a shade darker than Blaise's, and Blaise's face was rounded by a youthful softness that the older boy lacked, it was clear from their high cheekbones and tall noses that the boys were related. Blaise had pointed out his brother to Harry before, but their paths had never previously crossed.

"Thanks," said Blaise, accepting the letter and tucking it into his robes. "Anything new?"

"Not really. Another boyfriend dumped, but I think it's a different one than the one she had when we left," the boy said calmly. He turned to the other first years; curiously peering at them with eyes solemn yet friendly, and to counter Blaise's golden irises, fully black. "A strange sight, seeing you with Blaise, Daniel… and this must be Harry? A pleasure, of course. But I'm afraid I don't know you." Stepping around his younger brother, the boy offered a hand to the wide-eyed Tracey, who stared at it for a moment before shaking it daintily. Later, the other three would remember instead that she had curtsied. It was that sort of daintiness.

"Tracey Davis," she said with a smile.

"Mordred Zabini," he replied. "A pleasure to meet you as well. While I'd love to stay and chat, the stomach calls…"

Tracey quickly released the seventh year's grip, having held it for too long already, and he stepped away from her, disappearing into the Great Hall with a quick nod to Harry.

"Blaise," the blonde girl asked dreamily as they took their seats at the Slytherin table a minute later. "Your brother's a capable wizard, isn't he?"

"Well, he's not in Ravenclaw for nothing. He's one of Flitwick's favorites."

"And your family is rich, right?"

Blaise raised an eyebrow—it was a habit they had all started to pick up from their house head. "Well, bluntly speaking, yes," he said. "Why do you ask?"

"It's settled, then!" Tracey said gleefully. They all stared at her blankly. "Your brother," she pointed emphatically at Blaise as she said it, "Is the lucky man I'm going to marry!"

"_Marry?" _Blaise demanded, hardly noticing as Harry splurted pumpkin juice on him. "What, are you _insane_? You can't _marry_ my brother!"

"Well, not right now, of course," Tracey said with a frown. "But when I've graduated, assuming I've not found someone else…"

"No, you'll not!" Blaise snapped. "And you can't, anyways! My brother is—"

"Too old? When we won't be so different. My mum's almost eight years younger than my dad."

"No, that's not—he's—"

"Engaged?" Tracey guessed. "That can be broken off."

"No—"

"Got Plans after Hogwarts? He'll have six years to—"

"No, you idiot!" Blaise groaned. "My brother's _gay!_"

Although Blaise's shouting attracted some peculiar looks from nearby students, and it managed to pause Tracey for a moment. _Only_ a moment. "Well," she said, "That can be dealt with."

They all sighed and turned dejectedly to their meals.

"I've been wondering," said Harry over Tracey's dreamy sighs, "though rather afraid to ask—how is it you two know each other, Blaise? Daniel? And how does Mordred know you, Daniel?"

Blaise defiantly took a bite of some sort of noodle dish, marking the end to his participation in the conversation, but Daniel did not seem too opposed to sharing. "Mordred is my half-brother, too," she explained. "On my father's side, of course. Madam Zabini intended to marry my father, so he got involved in a diplomatic mission in Africa involving my great grandparents on my mother's side, and through that met my mother, who had arrived from England to help smooth things over. Of course, he and my mother really did marry, and had my brother and I together. But one does not just escape Madam Zabini—"

Blaise slammed his goblet on the table, for once breaking his ritual mealtime silence. "Enough of that!" he snapped. "Jeremiah Harper left my mother pregnant with my brother, and when she finally saw him again he had a family with two children. _My_ father, who had actually married my mother years before she was pregnant with me, had just died, and Harper dared taunt her over this—while at my Great-Aunt's summer gala, too. He committed social suicide, and actual suicide later on, the coward that he was."

Harry looked back and forth between the two. "I—I'm sorry. I didn't know your father was dead, Daniel."

She shrugged. "He was a git for not telling my mum about Mordred, and I never really knew him, anyways. Besides, like I said, one does not simply escape Madam Zabini…"

"Er, right," said Harry, turning back to his lunch Of course he had heard the rumors about Blaise's mother as a professional widow but as Blaise got quite testy when the topic arose out of respect for his friend if nothing else he was inclined to ignore the rumors.

"So we _are _like sisters!" Tracey suddenly exclaimed, turning to Daniel in a delayed revelation. "Half-sister-in-laws-to-be!"

Daniel was unimpressed. "I somehow find myself managing to be in agreement with Blaise," she said. "You will _not_ be marrying Mordred!"

"Say what you will," Tracey said defiantly. She crossed her arms and tossed her curls, trying for an elegantly proud look, but being only eleven the effect was lost. "I am destined to become a Zabini!"

Blaise groaned again. "Then you'll have to marry one of my cousins," he said shortly. "And that would require moving to France, as they don't much like Britain's weather."

"What have we got this afternoon?" Harry asked, eager to change the subject. He already knew, of course, but that was beside the point.

"Herbology," said Daniel. "But we've got a free period, so that's not 'til one. We could go down to the lake; the weather's nice."

"Hey!" Tracey said indignantly. She had just got around to helping herself to noodles. "Give me a chance to eat, would you?"

"It's not _our_ fault you've been too busy mooning over Mordred to be sensible," Daniel muttered, but Blaise had also gone back to eating, so the finished pair just sat and waited.

"So your brother—I mean, your full brother—is he also Ravenclaw?" Harry asked to fill the time.

"No; he's Slytherin," Daniel replied. She pointed down the table to a sixth year cluster, where one black boy sat reading, oblivious to the conversation around him. "But he might as well be Ravenclaw."

"You said yourself that you were offered Ravenclaw by the sorting hat," Harry recalled. "Must run in the family."

Daniel shrugged. "Well, honestly Micky would not have done well in Ravenclaw. He likes to read, but he's still an idiot. He would have been shunned in that house."

"Some of the Ravenclaws aren't so bright," Harry countered, thinking of one in particular who was having trouble in charms. She had consistently made a book more dusty when the spell was supposed to wipe it clean.

"No, I mean—intellectually he's fine. But when he closes the books he can be a real prat." Daniel shook her head, taking off her glasses to clean them. Harry resisted the urge to mimic the action, suddenly all too aware of the finger prints smudging his vision. "He's kind of a spoiled brat, having lived with my grandmother's family when we were little—I was still a baby, but he was old enough for the pampering to affect him. And you know why my name is Daniel? Because Micky wanted a little brother, and threw a temper tantrum when my mum tried to make it Danielle. Mum had just given birth and was exhausted and my father couldn't have cared less if I were named Edward Tredrich Alfred the Seventeenth, so Daniel stuck, and while we lived in Africa I was treated as a boy."

"Are you done?" Blaise asked with a bored poke at his leftovers. It was impossible to tell whether he meant to ask Tracey or Daniel, but Tracey took it to mean her and nodded, so they all stood and left the Great Hall, eager to enjoy the clear day.

—

—

—

Herbology ended at three pm, and the Slytherins were overjoyed to escape.

"Who knew that there could be so many ways in which pumpkins could be incredibly dull?" Blaise moaned, picking orange fibres out from his nails. Professor Sprout, in an attempt at a Halloween themed lesson, had them gutting different breeds of pumpkin for the evening's jack-o-lanterns, including a particularly nasty one that someone had the wonderful idea to crossbreed with the magical equivalent of a Venus fly trap, such that included in the guts were half-way decomposed rodent skeletons.

"Dinner's not 'til seven, right?" asked Tracey, her stomach voicing its thoughts on the manner in a loud grumble.

"Seven thirty," Blaise corrected. "So we've five and a half hours to kill. But—we've finished our homework, and I don't much feel like practicing today… any ideas? Harry?"

"Actually," said Harry, "I told Hagrid I'd go and see him this afternoon. You're welcome to come along, of course."

Blaise frowned, wrinkling his nose. "I'll pass, thanks. I rather value my teeth."

"Well _I'll_ go," said Tracey. "I like Hagrid. He's so simple. It's homely."

Daniel and Blaise looked at each other with something less than pleasure. "I'll come too," the girl decided in a flat tone. "Don't want to be stuck with that one."

"Or I with you," Blaise said, but then he sighed. "All alone on Halloween—how unromantic. Are you at least going to drop off your books?"

They had time to spare, so even though the dungeons were in the opposite direction of Hagrid's hut they followed Blaise into the nearest courtyard so they could enter the castle.

"It's _Levi-Oh-sa, not Levioh-Sah,_" an annoyed voice greeted them. "It's no wonder she hasn't got any friends!"

Harry looked across the courtyard to see Gryffindor first years streaming out of one of the towers. The speaker, looking sullen while the other Gryffindors laughed around him, was none other than Ron dWeasley."

"Who are they talking about now?" asked Tracey, while this tmie Harry posed the more important question—"They're just now getting to levitation?"

In answer to Tracey's question, a girl came pushing through the other Gryffindors, knocking into Ron so forcefully his bag fell to the ground. Its contents scatted around it. "Hermione, wait!" Neville Longbottom cried. He was trying to catch up with the girl, but in trying to avoid a fallen quill he stepped onto a loose sheet of paper which slipped out from under the boy and sent him flying into Ron's bag so that it split and what little had been left inside joined the rest of Ron's belongings across the walkway.

"Neville!" Ron shouted angrily.

The klutzy boy was already up and running after the girl. "Sorry, Ron!" he shouted back.

"Oh, Gryffindors," commented Blaise. "They don't even know how to do a simple _reparo!_ How sad."

Harry nodded in agreement with the others—it _was_ sad, especially considering Granger had known the spell before they'd even gotten to Hogwarts—but lagged behind as the others continued their treck to the dungeons. When the other three rounded the castle doors, he quickly pulled out his wand and turned back to the Gryffindors gathering Ron's things. Aiming carefully at the bag lying torn open on the ground, he muttered, _"reparo!"_, then quickly moved to rejoin his friends.

—

—

—

"What's this I hear about you lot being at the top of your classes?" Hagrid demanded cheerfully, handing the three Slytherin first years extra strong tea brewed in oversized mugs. Harry and Daniel pretended to sip, making Hagrid beam at him, while Tracey addressed the question.

"They say practice makes perfect, right?" she said cheerfully. "Besides, we're not actually the top of our classes; there's a few Ravenclaws and everyone's favorite Gryffindor to consider. And Professor Snape still prefers Draco Malfoy."

"That's not how I've been hearing it!" Hagrid boomed. Harry and Daniel glanced at each other skeptically, wondering which part exactly Hagrid found fault with. "Although…. There must be some of yer da' in yeh, Harry, what wit' the stories I hear from Professor McGonagall."

"My father?" That caught Harry's attention.

"He ewas always I' 'imself inter trouble, him an' 'is gang. Always teasin' yer mum. She couldn't stand 'im, at yer age."

Harry took time to process this. His mother had not liked his father, at Harry's age? This made Harry frown some. Liking or disliking someone—it all seemed so _permanent._ He did not like the Dursleys. He had _never_ liked the Dursleys. He liked Blaise, and Tracey, and Daniel—he had since they'd first met, and in the last month the bonds between them were truly solidifying.

What about Ron, or Draco? He could not say he liked Draco, and he could not say he disliked Ron. But with Ron as a Gryffindor, Harry doubted they would ever have any sort of a functional friendship. As for Draco—Harry was finding more and more that he did not _want_ to like the boy. He was arrogant, rude, and narrow-minded—had his mother thought that of his father, at his age?

The comparison of his and Draco's relationship to that of his parents' made Harry grimace.

"…and then he tripped and landed on the bag, and it tore right in half!" Tracey concluded with a grin, drawing a hearty laugh from Hargrid and bringing Harry back into the hut. How long had he not been paying attention? Hagrid's laughter made his head ring.

"Oh, first years, "Hagrid said cheerfully, taking a long swig from his tea mug.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Daniel grumbled. After all, they too were first years.

"Nothin', othing'," said Hagrid. The tears in his eyes betrayed his mirth. "Don't yeh mind it."

"In any case," said Daniel. "It has been lovely, but we've got to get back to the dungeons before the feast for some Slytherin business, and it's almost four thirty."

"Yes," said Harry, actually jumping at the prospect of escape from the hut that seemed to confining. Had he been lost in thought so long? It seemed as though every time someone mentioned something odd about his parents Harry lost track of time. He found it rather annoying. Harry wondered whether Blaise or Daniel got the same way when their fathers were brought up, but he knew if he asked them about it they would just repeat Blaise's _lonely orphan boy-who-lived_ speech and tease him mercilessly.

"Oh," said Hagrid, not trying to hid his disappointment over the abrupt cut-off. Tracey shoved the remnants of some sort of cookie—when had she gotten that?—into her mouth and pushed Fang's oversided head off her lap so she, too, could stand. "Well, don't be strangers, yer hear? 'specially you, Harry," the giant man said as they filed out the door. "And Harry, he added, just before the boy coiuld leave. "Yer should come down by yerself sometime. We can have a good long talk 'bout yer parents."

"Right," said Harry, though he was still put off by how he had lost track of the conversation. He felt, after a moment, a bit awkward about leaving it at that. His imput to the conversation had been two words, and now he was practically fleeing the man, after all. So before leaving, he added, "Thanks, Hagrid."

The grin Hagrid offered made Harry a bit embarrassed to have automatically categorized the man's offer as 'to be conveniently forgotten.' But what could he say? In Blaise's words—he was a Slytherin, after all.

"You all right, Harry?" asked Daniel. Once more Harry experienced the awkward sensation of being thrown back into the present. He blinked, realizing they were in the same courtyard as before, about to enter the cast.

_Maybe I should have been in Ravenclaw_, he thought a bit bitterly, referring to the way members of that house could often be caught staring dreamily into space after ending a sentence prematurely.

Belatedly: "Sorry?"

"You've been about as focused as a Gryffindor trying to study today," the girl said bluntly. "Please tell me you did not eat the pumpkin seeds Sprout said would make you high?"

Harry laughed. "Nah, I'm not a Gryffindor!" It was a running joke between the Slytherin quartet, started courtesy of Blaise's constant employment of the term whenever a Gryffindor tried to insult him, and conveniently applied to both of Daniel's comments. "Anyways, your brother—I mean your full brother, not Mordred—is a Slytherin too, so hasn't he told you what the party will be like?"

Daniel shook her head. "Not a word," she grumbled. "Just that I'd learn as a first year."

"You have to swear an oath at the beginning," Tracey piped. "My cousin told me you're sworn into secrecy in Salazar's name."

"If he was sworn into secrecy, how did he tell you that?" Daniel asked, making Tracey frown, seriously considering the question.

"Well, maybe they don't make you swear not to tell anyone about that part?" she suggested.

Harry's scar sent a violent jolt of pain through his skull as they passed the Great Hall, where through the door he could see Flitwick levitating hundreds of jack-o-lanterns made, Harry suspected, from the pumpkins they had gutted earlier, up to encase the usual candles that lit the false sky. His scar had been hurting more and more often since he had arrived at Hogwarts; varying in intensity from a prickling sensation as he sat down for dinner to a sharp stab like this on, strong enough to wake him from a nap during an especially boring lecture. Blaise invented all sorts of reasons for the pain, ranging from a portrait of him hitting its head on a cupboard to a magical allergy; Daniel had given him looks that warned him to stop being a baby; Tracey had gone on tangential rants about this uncle's bruise that lasted twenty years to that aunt's phantom third limb, and by the end of these stories no one was really sure how they related to Harry's scar. He had tried to ignore it—it had occasionally hurt him back at Privet Drave and he had never made a big deal of it—but it made him irritable when it struck out of the blue like that. So much so that in response to Tracey's solution for the discontinuity in her secrecy story he snapped, "Or maybe they never swore anything?"

The remainder of the trek to the dungeons was silent.

—

—

—

Blaise proved easy enough to re-locate; although not at the fireplace the quartet usually occupied Draco Malfoy's posse had laid a similar claim to a cluster of the common room's black leather furniture in the very center of the room. "Harry," the blond boy greeted with a rather cold voice, betraying the smile he so easily flashed. "Blaise here was just talling us that you'd gone down to Hagrid's for tea. Frankly, I'm surprised you're all still in one piece."

"One piece?" Harry repeated.

"Yes," Draco confirmed. He leaned back in his couch, throwing an arm jauntily over the ornate backing. "It's hardly disguisable—his brutish nature. I'm surprised they even let him live on the grounds. Father always says he's a danger to students…"

"Have you even met Hagrid?" demanded Harry, still feeling a bit brash due to the only somewhat subdued throbbing of his scar. He looked to Blaise, who seemed as keen as possible to escape the circle of chairs, his hands gripping tightly at the arm rests as he sat so far forward in his seat he looked about to fall right out of it. Harry did not blame him. His earlier thought of Draco as someone he was not sure he liked had solidified into downright distaste—although perhaps that was the scar speaking? "Never mind that," he said over Draco's attempt at an offended reply. "Blaise, weren't we going to work on our history homework before the feast? You were _supposed_ to meet us with the books."

"Right you are!" Blaise agreed with excessive enthusiasm, jumping out of his seat. "It totally slipped my mind, chatting with our good friend Draco here…"

"History homework?" Pansy, who Harry had not noticed sitting between Crabbe and Goyle on the couch across from Draco's, asked distastefully. "Merlin, you lot are getting to be as bad as Granger!"

For some reason Harry had to fight back the urge to defend Granger, though the idea of defending her would, on later reflection, make him want to gag. "Oh, you won't be joining us, then?" Tracey asked. "You know, we've been having the most interesting discussions about the Seven Proclaimations of Svrdenblag the Second recently—"

"Well, it's been a pleasure talking with you lot," said Blaise over everyone else's collective groans. "You all have some very interesting ideas about the way the world should be. A shame our discussion has been cut short."

"Indeed," said Draco, still staring at Harry with that unpleasant smile. "Perhaps next time Hagrid invites you to _tea_ Harry will consider staying here too. I'm sure my father would be delighted to send some stories for _the_ Harry Potter."

Harry bit his tongue. It a necessary precaution, to hold back a great deal of words mainly directed at telling Draco that there was no way in hell he would be having any sort of discussion regarding Hagrid or any of Draco's father's stories without the end result being a punch to the blond boy's face, and quickly made for the stairs to the boys dormitory. The other three were only a step behind him.

"_Merlin's beard_ is Draco a prat!" Blaise moaned as the door clicked shut behind them. "My brother warned me about families like the Malfoys and their bratty little princelings, but _honestly_…"

"Families like the Malfoys?" Harry repeated, kicking off his shoes and rolling onto his bed, not bothering to draw the silken green curtains aside. The darkness was soothing, to some extent.

"Wizarding Royalty," Daniel clarified. "Or so they like to consider themselves."

"Malfoys, Parkinsons, Crabbes, Goyles—how on earth did they all end up together, our year?" Blaise asked. "Can we file this as some sort of wizarding conspiracy?"

"Oh, come now. Don't act so superior. You're a pure-blood, too, and I know for a _fact_ your mother has gone to _all_ the Malfoy's parties for the last four years, at least."

"You only know that because you were there too, Harper," Blaise growled.

"And if you weren't such a brat, your brother would have taken you, too, Zabini."

There was a moment of silence, then Harry was moaning as Daniel pulled open his bed curtains. The green light filtered in from the lake-lights only seemed to irritate his scar more. "Don't think you can hide away from us in here, Harry," the girl growled. "Malfoy and Blaise aside, even _you_ have been more of a prat than usual today." Harry's response was to roll over and bury his face in his pillow.

"Oh, leave him alone, Dani," said Tracey. "Obviously he's just homesick for the muggle world—"

_That_ got him moving. The pillow his face was buried in a moment before was swiftly thrown across the room, missing Tracey by meters but close enough that the intended target was clear. Harry's horrible aim proved to be the perfect cure for the tension that had built up in the room, and all four dissolved into fits of laughter, though that, too, seemed to irritate Harry's scar.

"It's really bothering you, isn't it?" Daniel observed when the mirth had dissolved a bit, watching as the boy rubbed at his forehead in what was becoming a habitual action. "Or are you just being a wimp?"

"If you're going to make fun of him, stop acting like you _care_ first," Blaise ordered. He had fallen into the seat next to his own bed, while Tracey sat on the trunk resting at its end. "But really, Harry, maybe there was something at Hagrid's that got it acting up? Maybe Draco was right and it wasn't tea he gave you…"

"Don't tell me you're siding with Draco about Hagrid!" Harry said incredulously. "Didn't you hear the way he talked about him? It was like he didn't even consider Hagrid human." Blaise said nothing, but Harry caught the glance that passed between him and Daniel as she sat down beside Tracey. "No," he said, sighing, "It was just tea. And it's almost better now, anyways. What do you say we play some chess?"

"Oh," said Tracey, clearly disappointed. "So we're not going to discuss Svrdenblag the Second?"

"_No!"_

—

—

—

When the bell tolled seven times, Harry and Blaise put away the chess set, and the girls went back to their dormitory. The boys dug through their drawers for the proper clothing to wear under their robes, and abandoned their sneakers for black dress shoes. They felt strange wearing their full robes again, having grown accustomed to the day to day uniform and cloak, and definitely felt quite foolish donning on the pointed hats that had been collecting dust atop their wardrobes since the opening feast, but when they came down to the common room they found the whole of their house in similar wear.

"These hats are ridiculous," Tracey complained as the girls rejoined the boys. "Honestly, they haven't been in fashion for _decades_. Someone ought to petition to remove them from the uniform!"

Harry turned to agree, but was cut off by a voice both quiet and commanding; _"Quiet_," ordered Professor Snape. Silence rippled through the room as the Slytherins turned to face their head of house. "Now," he said when they were all settled. "As usual, the Slytherin House Party will occur after the feast. During the feast, however, I expect all but the assigned managers in the hall at all times. As we have had, oh, _issues_ in the past with certain students trying to return to the dorms _before_ the feast's end," he looked pointedly at the first years, and they all shifted on their feet, having all discussed the idea many times during the last week, "Certain steps have been taken to ensure that this will not occur. As soon as you exit the dorm, you will trigger a protection charm in the wall that will prevent the entry of any student. If you still insist on trying, however, Miss Hawthorne has taken the liberty of applying an array of wards, my personal favorite being one which will compel you to come running back to the great hall singing at the top of your lungs muggle children's songs, and no, not _currently_ knowing any will not protect you, Zabini." Blaise deflated somewhat, reversing his half-way completed turn to Harry. "However," Snape continued, cutting off the muttering his warning had triggered. "If that is not enough to hold you back, Mr. LaConner has informed me of his need for test subjects for his NEWT-level potions. _I will know_ if you so much as descend below the first floor at any time in the duration of the feast, and will consider that as volunteering."

Harry had never seen Snape look so plainly gleeful—if you could read his smirk to represent that. But even more unusual, as he watched the man address his students, Harry found there to be little coldness in his warnings, that when his students giggled and laughed at the prospect of humiliating someone by forcing them to sing _muggle_ songs, his mouth twitched with amusement, that he was not looking down at the house but out at it. Somehow this calm, amused man seemed strange and unfamiliar to Harry, even though he'd sat in the Potions laboratory twice a week since September and tried to see past the man's harsh attitudes. Now that he had seen beyond them, Harry only felt more confused.

Following their House Head's warning, the Slytherins filed out of the common room, chatting eagerly among themselves about the feast and party to come—although whenever a first year got too close the party-talk was abandoned. Together they climbed up from the dungeons, taking the same route they took on a daily basis but buzzing with enthusiasm. When they entered the Great Hall, their expectations were exceeded.

The Great Hall glowed orange in the light of the hundreds—thousands—of jack-o'-lanterns' Harry had seen Flitwick charm earlier. Ghosts—more ghosts than Harry had even known existed—chatted amongst themselves and the students as they patrolled the walkways between tables overladen with the feast already beginning. Pumpkin soup sat in bowls on the Slytherins' plates as they took the same seats they had for the opening feast; the skeletons remaining from meat dishes lorded over them and snapped at those who tried to take the food out from under them; spaghetti twisted around itself like slithering snakes; tiny self-refilling cauldrons held juices of different colors and textures that, when poured, created apparitions out of the steam.

By the time the dinner dishes started to vanish from the tables, either by fading into ghostlike shells of themselves that dissolved at the slightest wind or by the food contained on the platters transforming into spiders or rats or cave pixies, and new dishes heaped with deserts of all shapes and sizes began to take their places when no one seemed to be looking, most of the students were already groaning with pleasure and pushing back from their seats. Tracey was unafraid of the chocolate crickets that wriggled over each other, chirping fearfully as they tried to escape, and bit into more than a few with crunches that made Harry's stomach turn.

"I can't eat another bite! I swear my stomach's about to burst," Blaise proclaimed, although he sounded far too light-hearted for anyone to believe him.

"Hopefully there's not more food at the Slytherin Party," worried Harry. Though the pain of his scar had finally dissipated, it had been replaced by a buzz of good food and strong butterbeer, stolen from further down the table by Crabbe or Goyle at Draco's request. _His_ stomach really did feel about to burst, so much so that the very thought of another helping of pumpkin pudding had him tasting bile.

"Oh, I'm sure there will be," Draco cut in from across the table. Harry wondered how the blond had even heard him over the din of the Great Hall. "Our house elf brought with him a whole supply of sweets freshly delivered from France."

"Really, guys," Harry sighed, sinking even lower into his seat. "What on earth is a house—"

"TROLL!" someone screamed as the doors of the Great Hall slammed open. "IN THE DUNGEONS!" Professor Quirrel came running down central aisle. "Troll in the dungeon!" He came to an abrupt halt dead center, staring at the Head Table over the sudden paralysis of the hall. "Thought you ought to know."

As the professor's body hit the ground in a dead faint, the hall erupted again, as benches were scraped back, students crashed into each other, dishes were overturned. Harry was not as quick as the rest of his table mates to stand; the bench was pulled out from under him and he fell down between it and the table, his head colliding with one of the plates that had slipped and making his vision fade in and out, the noise of the hall vanish—no, that was Dumbledore speaking.

"Prefects, escort your students back to the dormitories. Teachers, with me."

While the other tables were quickly draining of students, the Slytherins stayed stock-still. Harry stood in time to see Rose, Adrian, and the three other Slytherin prefects clustering around Dumbledore. Their house, obviously could not so easily retreat to their dormitories—but where was Snape? The man was not there to quiet the rising voices of his students with a few choice words.

"Is your scar hurting again?" Daniel asked Harry as he gingerly rubbed his forehead.

He shook his head, peering around the Great Hall. "I hit it on the table, I think." Though maybe it was his scar. He could not tell, with all this excitement. "_How_ does a _troll_ get into the dungeons?" he asked Blaise incredulously.

"I bet it's those Weasle-by twins," said Draco. "Thought they'd have a little fun and prank us Slytherins."

Harry did not have time to reply that that did not answer his question before Adrian had hopped up onto the end of the Slytherin table, so he was standing amidst the first years. He was wearing boots, Harry noticed, black leather boots with pointed toes visible at the base of his robes as his heels squished frightened candy bugs—but Harry must have hit his head _extremely_ hard for him to be paying attention to that.

"Sit," the blond head boy commanded simply from his perch above them, and they all sat, hesitantly. Adrian may not have had the same level of natural authority that Snape could so easily draw on, but there was not a person at the table who had not been at one point at least teased, if not sent to the hospital wing for weeks on end, by the young man who seemed to tower over them so easily. "For now, we will wait here, until the professors return from their search." Harry turned just in time to see the last of the Great Hall's many doors shut behind the trailing robes of one of the professors. "The line Snape set earlier regarding volunteering for my potions testing has been moved to these doorways. I am also looking for additional volunteers to participate in some hands-on research for a paper on the practicality of certain curses being taught in self-defense classes in many well-known training centers. Asking to use the loo will be considered volunteering for that. Capice?"

The Slytherins nodded, expecting at any moment for Adrian to crack, steal one of their wands, and jinx them all until their heads were indiscernible from their feet. Yet the wizard simply jumped off the table head, returning to his four prefects, and directed them each to one of the bigger doors in the hall.

"Merlin's beard!" Quirrel suddenly shouted as Rose was walking past him. "I'm late!"

"Professor Quirrel," the prefect greeted him. "Glad of you to join us again."

He stared at her a second, not seeming to understand why she was there. "C—c—c–certainly, M—miss Haw…th—thorne," he stammered out. "And—ah," he turned on heels to the head table. "I ou—ought to g—go… T—to find the tr—troll, you know…" The defense professor ran out of the Great Hall almost as quickly as he had run in, not giving anyone a chance to point out that the dungeons' door was on the opposite end of the hall.

"We're doomed," Blaise commented glumly. "With anyone like that looking for the troll we're sure to be here all night. There goes our party!"

When Professor Snape finally came back to the hall, it was nearly eleven thirty, and most of the Slytherins had taken to napping on the floors under blankets conjured by some of the older students. Harry was too tired to care at that point that the party had been cancelled, and wandered back to the dungeons with the others half in a dream and collapsing into his bed for a fitful sleep being woken frequently by the stinging of his scar.

_Extremely Long Author's Note: if you'd rather not read my silly rants, feel free to skip ahead to the last little paragraph!_

_First off: apologies for the long wait! I have just returned from 3 weeks spent in Japan, and Uni orientation, and have been taking my host brother around town for the past week doing all sorts of crazy things. Although I wrote the first 5,500 or so words while in Japan, typing up these words has turned out to be rather troublesome, partially because I was halfway thinking in Japanese while there so grammar and spelling got a little wonky, and because this chapter was very, very slowly written over those 3 weeks and finished in this past one, meaning the style took a lot of work to shift so that the pieces kind of work together. Not only was I attempting to think in a language with relatively reversed grammar from English, the three books I had time to read while there were a) "Anasi Boys" by Neil Gaiman, b) "The Night Circus" by Erin Morgenstern and c) "The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead" by Max Brooks. If you have read any pairing of those books, you know that they have both extremely different subject matter and extremely different writing style, and as someone whose writing is rather easily influenced by the style of good books they are reading there are noticeable shifts in style in this chapter. For that, I do apologize._

_Also, because this chapter just grew and grew, it, logically, came to take more and more time to complete._

_I'm just glad to have gotten finished with this chapter at last! To all the people who have taken the time to review in my absence, thank you so much for your comments! To the people who disliked "The Rose Arc", don't worry! That is the last planned narration outside of Harry' and Snape's POVs for a looooong time to come. Harry and I have recently had some bonding time—and yes, this does mean that his character should solidify quite a bit more in the next few chapters. _

_On what is turning into the more defensive part of this A/N (warning, ranting, redundant, and not exactly pertinent to anything in particular): We're getting into some much more important stuff regarding the overarching story plot, which no, has not been fully revealed at this point in the series, so please stop pestering me about how you don't understand how this detail or that relates to the overarching plot of the whole story. I will clarify now: this is a story with a plot extending at least through the time of the 7 books, and will have some MAJOR deviations to canon. The plot of Harry's first year largely revolves around the plot of the first canon book, but my writing brings in quite a bit more details of day to day life and the sort of things the current main canon deviation (Harry being in Slytherin) would change. The plot of the whole story has a lot to do with how the simplest things could have completely changed Harry's fate, and I will be killing and saving characters that at crucial points were in canon saved and killed, and the like. Consider this my official disclaimer, which seems rather redundant to be including in something published as a fanfiction, that I am not a perfect writer, that things I include in each chapter will not always be entirely understandable until the next chapter or maybe even years' worth of chapters has been posted, and that canon will change._

_Some other important things to clarify, which I have tried to explain as best as I can by this point but from a few reviews on this story/others…_

_Daniel Harper is a girl. Yes, her name is Daniel, a usually male name. That is briefly covered in this chapter, in case it bothered anyone that it had not been explained._

_Blaise Zabini is a boy. Blaise Zabini is a boy. Blaise Zabini is a boy._

_Rose Hawthorne and Adrian LaConner are Slytherin upperclassmen (5__th__ and 7__th__ years, respectfully) and OCs designed to fit into the roles of older Slytherin students, as there are few canonically and Harry would definitely have to occasionally interact with his upperclassmen if he were in Slytherin, and have their own side-stories that weave them into the overarching plot. Now that I've lain groundwork for their characters they will not necessarily be mentioned every chapter, but they are still important characters to keep in mind for the future._

_Because no one is really sure how to handle many of Hogwarts' logistics, I have these clarifications to make: 1) Harry's class size is around 40 students, with older classes being relatively smaller and younger classes being much larger, a topic that will be discussed later on. 2) Harry's class schedule: in first year, there are 4 possible class periods in a day (plus the possibility of flying and astronomy) and each house has 2 classes a day, typically one in one of the morning periods and one in the afternoon, excepting double potions. Charms, Transfiguration, and Potions all have classes two days (Potions as an individual house's class followed by double potions Slytherin/Gryffindor and Hufflepuff/Ravenclaw) and DADA, Herbology, and Hist. of Magic once a week. Older students have more possible class periods, different distributions based on year, and, in some cases, different teachers from the younger students. Some staff see fit to use time turners. As it is rather impossible, I am not sticking to Jo's scheduling._

_Unrelated question: anyone have some good exclamations beyond "Merlin!" and "Merlin's Beard" that I can work into the story? When they're all older, swearing will prove quite convenient, but until then…_

_That's all, folks! (finally?) If you read this all, I am amazed and proud of you. If you didn't read any of the A/N but this bit, please review anyways; I need the comments and critiques! I am not sure when the next chapter will be up, as I am moving into my dorm next week and starting class the week after, but your reviews always encourage me to get my butt in gear._


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